Twee vrouwen
en een jas
Dedicated
to the
Jewish social work ,
Dorine de
Gruyter,
in memory of
Olga, my
mother
And with
thanks to Paul Groenendaal and to Elma Verhey,
without whom this book would not have come
about
Foreword
On the 1st
September 1992
Erica writes
hesitantly in a nice small, silk-bound booklet, "was very cozy ..."
and she ponders further on the title of the diary that she wants to track the
reporting of the quest which it has decided.
The reason is
threefold
An inner need
which has become increasingly stronger in recent years.
All the chaos of her childhood surfaced.
she sits at
her kitchen table looking out over the gallery railing over Nieuwegein. In this
house she lives satisfied. Now is time to dare.
And she
begins to write and muses. The title….
They could
not have suspected in the summer of 1994, at the same kitchen table but much
happier, with a sigh of relief and glad to work on her book with friends, the
manuscript would shut and satisfyingly say, "Right, now we can eat. I have
a beetroot salad. Jewish recipe. Do you
like it? "
They would
certainly not have suspected two years ago, that her book would be in the shop
windows in 1994.
Yet that is
so. In August 1994 she was eating beetroot salad with two editors. Twice
repeated she had to go through exhausting the entire confrontation with its own
past, word for word, to make a diary into
a book. Popular portions, clarify things that diarists always perceived
as historic.
I was one of
the editors and I can assure you that the whole process from September 1992
until now, two years later was a hellish emotional period for Erica.
Paul Groenendaal
Leiden, 1 september 1994
September
15.
I have made a
decision. I will ask Dorine to help me-finally- to go back to the past.
I have told
that to my friends Piet S. and Corrie van R. Corrie is an old girlfriend that I
know from the anti -racism work and Piet is chairman of the club where I am a
secretary. I have told them that if I continue to function that I will need
their help. That is why you are my friends? Through difficult times to help
each other?
With Corrie I
had a good talk, among other things, the power that comes from daring to
continue to be vulnerable. She is currently in a difficult period and suffering
physically and mentally.
I gave her
calcium and magnesium, herbs and vitamins. In her family I am “the herb lady”
not completely unjustly.
Piet gave me
as an answer a mountain of work that by tomorrow morning had to be done.
for the first
time I realized that my teeth bit together when I heard my own keys rattle
while I opened the door to the deadbolt. Memories of the Martha foundation.
Later that
evening. The memories become clearer.
The leader, Ilsa Love, had the compassionate
habit of using her keys, if she wanted to "admonish" children.
1943
-Nieuwersluis?
We stood in
line one behind the other, naked, with a towel and a washcloth. Forty children.
Two at a time we were washed in a cold bath. Now again I smell the scent of it.
And in the dorms, there were many bed
wetter’s. Beds which were, roughly forty centimeters apart.
16.
Woe betides you if you have not said or sang
well before bed your prayers. God's love also expressed itself as
"they" heard children still whispering : then they made you stand
before your bed, cold feet on the ground, and wait and see how long they let
you stand. Sometimes for hours. And you dared not to go to bed or to say
anything. I was always picked out. If I had not knitted well , I had to knit at
night sitting on the marble stairs. If she was back on time and not pleased,
you got there "seams" in. And sometimes she forgot me. I sat there
half naked, until she had to go to the toilet and just saw me sitting there.
Stopping
blows. Every time going up and down the line. I
could never do it good and flee enough. When it was my turn , it was
time for slaps, until I was half unconscious. What made her even angrier was
that I could not respond. From fear, or also pride?
Then you had
to eat on the penalty bench, the “biekenbank” and you were not allowed to play.
In was proud
of my father , who could get on with her. Who brought so many sweets that all
the children, also those that had visitors could eat sweets too. What was left
over was taken away by Miss Geert Knoet. She searched me to make sure that I
did not hide any. All the children called him Papa and loved him.
Emmie Veldkamp- as snow white so beautiful. Red
cheeks, pitch-black eyes and hair. She sat behind me in school and kept
pricking me in my back with a pin. Finally I had enough; I turned around slowly
and dropped solemnly my ink pot over her head empty.
That day was
I beaten so much with the walking stick of Mr. van de Berg that I had to be
taken to the hospital. The children bullied me so much, because I never said or
did anything back. After the ink pot scene was that over for good. They saw
that I "just" only responded when it suited me. Nevertheless Geert
Knoete still saw me as a good victim, was why?
17.
3 september
1992
The name of Margaret G. Van der H. was
Greetje. She studied with me the Bible sitting in Alphen aan den Rhijn and
comes from the Martha charity. She made contact with me and we made an
appointment. Today at Central station in Den Haag. Neutral territory. We arranged to meet at the
third desk in the hall, at three o'clock and because we did not know each other
she would recognize me by a bright pink umbrella that I was carrying.
My train
arrived at a quarter to three , right on time. And while I stepped off the
platform and walked to the hall, I looked around to see if I could recognize
her. She should be wearing a red jacket. I did not see her so I waited
And as time
passed, the passengers around me were together at the counter and rushed to
their trains and I saw homeless and drug addicts. I became despondent and more
despondent .What could have gone wrong?
After waiting an hour I took the train home.
Money thrown
away, that journey and now I am skint. I can’t travel until I have money again.
Preparations for the municipal platform Global Awareness, where I among others
with Piet work, has so far cost nearly 100 euros on shipments, letters and the
like. It is voluntary work, therefore I have to see if I will get it back, and
if so when.
So I have just called Margaret: It was my
fault that the appointment did not go according to plan. I had Thursday in my
diary and she as teacher could only get Wednesday free. Therefore she waited
for an hour on Wednesday for nothing. We have now an appointment for next
Sunday, 7 September.
Then she
comes to me, not on neutral territory!
She told me,
via telephone, things about the Martha foundation that I did not Know any more.
About farmer Kwakernaak for example whose farm next to the home, whose calves I
could take care of. Oh yes , I still remember
that .
ik doopte de kalfjes zelfs , en voor
de stier , die altijd in zijn hok zat en die vreselijk hard kon loeien, was ik
erg bang.
I baptized
even the calves, and the bull, which was always in his kennel and who could
howl terribly hard, I was very scared of. Margaret told of the shoe maker of the charity , over
the subsequent build-up of the group of children. And I told him about the
injustice that I, because I was allowed to study, was held responsible for the
behavior of the younger children in my group. We talked for a long time , but I
can not visualize her.
There are a
lot of people of my age searching their
past. Rien G. is one of them. I know him only from the telephone. He too
is searching and has stories that for an “normal” man come across as
unreal. Rien is grown up in a Christian family and no one could explain to him
over his (orthodox ) circumcision. He has lived in Alpha aan de Rijn and later
in Boskoop. He remembered groups of children that rode bicycles in the Martha
foundation. I remember the kilometers long marches that we did in lines of
three ,to and through villages around Alphen. Very recognizable as asylum
children ,but bicycling ? I don’t remember that . The only bicycle that I
remember , I got from my father and that was stolen within two weeks! the
leadership will have had fun with that.
Family Cote.
Father was vice president, mother was a woman that every child wanted. We were
children , without parents, without family ,without backgrounds. They were very loved by us girls
that were growing up .I studied with
Mieke their daughter and I still have a photo of her that she is in with other
friends from school.
4 September
1992
Memories. Nieuwersluis. White, Sunday sleeved aprons,
black worsted stockings, clogs. White metal crib and curtains with lots of lace. Was that toys or
did babies lie in them? A very large house ,a park around about with a large
grass field.
19.
Upstairs was
a hall: The toilets flooded over, stink
and filth everywhere. No memories of the layout of the house or the daily
affairs .
Later, after 1946, Alphen aan den
Rijn. The group
where I first sat , was right of the building. That was of the leader (of day of night) Geert Knoet. Later on I sat
above in the group M2… the electric cables hung loose out the wall. I got a
shock and was unconscious for a while.
on a bench in a small alcove in the hall I came around. In the hall of
M2 I learned other children songs and dances. I made a dance from “ zeg
kwezelken wildet gij dansen?” I still
remember that dance and in bed I told
the kids always (horror) stories , where
the others always huddled
together in bed. That could then apparently.
Was it there
that I first got my menstruation? I was eleven years old and no longer in the
group of Geert Knoet. I must have been in panick when I found blood in my bed
in the morning. Scared to get punishment- or that I had a fatal illness.
But the
leader ( I don’t know which one) told me that I was now a Big Girl and no
longer could I play with the boys. She gave me clean sheets and strange-looking
terry "canvases" with a hole on each side and a waist belt. That was
that, that was my sexual information sessions and that of the girls of my
generation.
The school
attic, which stood on the site. What I did there? I was there sometimes for
drawing lessons? There were antique busts and heads of plaster and marble and
it smelled and was very dusty.
Mr. Van Dijk
from the third class sat with his hand in my pants . If I reacted he told me to
“shut up” and pinched me hard.
20.
These are
memories that come up. I don’t remember any of the other leaders except the
sadistic women Geert Knoet and Ida de Liefde
( the corpse if compassion , “so as we called her) she got later an eye
sickness , literally fire red eyes and according to tradition would go blind.
We called that the punishment of God. There were also good leaders , such as
the one Margaret called : Leny Zwaal.
Margreet
found it unlikely that I was made
responsible for twelve young people from my group ....I was studying and was
the only one that had a small room for myself- a former kitchen- where I could
do my homework.
“But” said
the former leader ( who?) “then you should make sure that the youngsters stay
sweet” or words to that effect. That I do not remember names! The result was
that I could not do my homework in the afternoon or evenings. I taught myself
from the clock tower that I could see out my window , to sleep and wake up ,
sometimes at four in the morning to do my homework. I had to be a good example
.Even now is six hours sleep enough! I had to go to bed at the same time as
the others and was controlled if my
light was out.
That ”
privilege “lasted less than a year. Then I had to go back to the “dorm “ and my
room became a kitchen again. At least in my memory.
Slak van
Beek. That was me. That is what they called me. Slow, clumsy, always the last
in the line, whatever line. In the line by Geert Knoet , for every run in the
black stockings or knitting on Sunday gray hosiery. How often did I have to
take my work back and start again? And how often did I get beaten because I was
the last in the line?
21.
5 September
1992
Zij van Vlink
, a girl in my class, whose brother had a sort of animal magnetism for me. It
depended on her if I may walk with her brother over the school grounds. It cost
me my best books. Pure blackmail!
Rieke and
Liesje Olie and their brother , who suddenly after the war were called Olij.
The choir of Jo Toet , partner of Daniel Waayenberg, and the songs that we
sang:
The heavens
remains gloomy hung down
A dead
silence reigns supreme
Creation
grieves, she has no songs
And the organ
tone of the forest is stupid ....
That has
always stayed with me. And now comes a thought to me and a singing game over
spring from princess Irene that we learned:
We are the
hares out of the woooods
The small
hares out of the woooods
and eating a
hazelnut….
Today I read
the Nieuwe Israelitisch Weekblad (NIW)from 28 August that was sent to me from
the telephonist from the Jewish social work . The tears are in my eyes as I
read the column from G. Philip Mok: “Am Jisraeel Chai.”
I am a Jew in
heart and soul. I realize this especially , because, even though
my past was by the Martha charity
very Christian and baffling , is very
agitated by the reading of the NIW and this column.
Will anybody
ever bring my soul to her right place?
22.
Margreet was
here. With a photo album full of photos of children from the buildings of the
Martha foundation. Truly also a picture of Geert Knoet! Margreet stayed till
five o’clock. I only recognized her when I saw her childhood photos. She is now
a grown up lady and a teacher. And I have been stated as being incapable to
work.
Although I am
particularly strained, there are still no emotions that come up with the
looking, talking about and recognizing of pictures from this time. Strange ,
actually. Names , names of people and places it was not more than that. Or not
yet? Just scents come back. And the tinkle of the many chains of Miss Corvase
the German teacher
And the face
of the pathetic spinster of needlework,-who
was also bullied by me.
We talked
about the family Cote, also for Margreet a very loved family. It was a shame that Mieke had so little
attention , because her parents were caring for more than four hundred
and fifty children. And hospitality and love, that the children received from
no one else.
23.
Still 7
September , evening
I have
asked Paul, my dear friend from the past
and still, whether he wants to read my
writings. And if it may ever be a book ,
would he be my editor?
In the years
past I've never been able to tell him anything from my childhood. And
when I tried it sounded confusing and
incomprehensible to him . And still I
panicked , as he practically forced me to go into the past, how lovingly
and patiently he tried. It caused unbearable tension between us.
My strange
reactions to his innocent remarks, my off-track anxiety and panic attacks , and
I crawled into my shell when he became irritated. His bohemian - like attitude
toward my need for security. Love and security, very civil, are synonymous with safety for me. For him it means trouble, curtailing his
freedom. Doubly, as a clipped bird in a
cage. That can not continue to go well. And therefore did not go well.
After two
years of silence I made contact with him. This is also the way to tell him
about my youth, all those things, all those fears that surface. Will I persevere to the end? And will Dorine
, my friend from the Jewish social work , and Paul , my old friend , able to
provide enough support for it?
Paul also has
his stories. Stories from his childhood, how he experienced the
war. And the years after. His life is a continuous line, with peaks of course,
like an ECG., But his Memories are a common thread running through his life.
And me? I have the feeling that my life only halfway in my adulthood begins.
The way back from there is not even visible, but it must be there. I'm finally
not come into the world as an adult, or without background or parents.
24.
The memories
keep coming. There is now no stopping them. When I was fourteen , in 1949, I
could stay whenever I wanted to at my uncle Bart and aunt Marie and their two
daughters ( Marie is the one that arranged for me to be taken from my father
and placed in the Martha foundation , But I had not realized that yet). After
staying there a few times they told me , that I May leave the Martha foundation
and come and live with them, if I promised never more to have contact with my
father! I did not realize that she therefore would experience the ultimate
triumph, by taking my father’s only child away- for good - after years
before, my father had me taken away from her. He told me once how he
accidentally had witnessed how they mistreated me and how he then took me, but
that's another story. Aunt Marie thought she’d
have cheap household help from
me? Until that point I knew no more about housekeeping than drying up .
After a short period of reflection I refused to give up my father. I had to
return to the Martha charity and I never stayed there again! They cried with
anger and disappointment but I never regretted my decision. Even though I was
thus in the Martha Foundation, and even though I was not yet aware of the
purpose and background.
Yet I was
then, just as unconsciously, an arrogant weight. I must have been nineteen
years and I just started working in the council office in the town of Woerden.
I had left the Martha foundation and was free to visit my father. With him in
Amsterdam, also lived uncle Coen (his brother) and his wife Aunt Cor. Uncle
Coen was a park worker and I worked in an office. I suggested that he was a
staff member and I officer. Absurd and ridiculous. We had words, it was not fun
anymore. Maybe I wantedto offend them by punishing them for leaving me in the
Martha foundation. In my childhood I stayed
with my father and with them?
Then they had to stay together in a house and were busy trying to get my father
, who was alone out, because they had a family. Grandpa was already dead….
25.
Grandpa !
That small house that I can still smell. Grandpa , whom I passionately loved,
who sat me on his lap , read and played with me, who cut all the cartoons out
of the newspaper and pasted them in a big book for me and upstairs there was
more big books and cartoons and other things were I was allowed to play . I
realized that in later years my grandpa and my father , played a smaller role
in my life , among other reasons , because, they both did more for the
youngsters of number 88( grandpa lived at number 90 on the Plaatijzerweg) and
for their mother, auntie Ella. I felt that I did could not come between or be
involved there .But the short time that I lived with my father and grandfather
and came to auntie Ella’s and played with the youngsters , Henk and Erich ( it
was not longer than a half a year), was the only rally happy time of my youth.
Back to the
Martha Foundation.
It's the
feeling. No conscious memory. It must have been dark, cold and wet. Rain and
wind, when I arrived in Nieuwersluis.
I have the
same feeling when I think of how I was brought
from one hiding place to another
to a person's hand, with maybe a briefcase or a bag in the other hand.
Actually I
can’t remember real memories out of that period. It is like a thin black veil
which is located over the entire past. You see it and know that there is something behind, but to see
through it is so difficult. There is nothing, even for only a moment,
illuminated, allowing you to see everything clearly.
I was there,
at Serreschans, in Nieuwersluis. It stank and was noisy and humid. In the
evening we folded our clothes on our shoes ,
some wore wooden shoes - so that we could flee if necessary.
26.
I had nightmares, others banged evening and
night with their heads rhythmically against the headboard of their bed. I know
of at least one time I'm sleepwalking into the dining room to sit and sat there all night, with my arms folded. Until the group came for
breakfast and woke me up. That is how it was told to me later on. Geert Knoet had to – with cold water- wash and
dress me completely.I seem to have come far away.
During every
air raid, all attacks on or near the railway line Amsterdam - Utrecht, we dove
at night under the beds. Or during the day, under the tables or in the ditch.
And when we gathered wood in the forest across the street, we looked panicked
for a tree to stand against.Their was a farm in the forest. If we were there in
the area we pushed in and stood against the wall. One child from the group once
stole something there. For that , later on all of us got one at a time , a beating. Geet Knoet knew how to give a
beating. And I never had the impression that she did so reluctantly.
Two
dormitories. Hepatitis broke out, jaundice, diarrhea and vomiting. Then we got
punishment. If you had to throw up everything was shoveled back on the board,
different food put over it and you had to eat it .
For days you
were given the same plate of food . That really happened.
On Friday
afternoon we went for a bath. Very soapy water, probably there was no real soap
anymore .All forty children went into the same bath water at least that is how
I remember it. I definitely remember on a Friday after the bath , leading
everybody to their knees beside the bed
. There we were in our our nightdresses or pyjamas , and I spoke facing where I believed East to
be out a prayer. Where did I get that from! Even Geert Knoet later on knelt and prayed with me.
27.
In that time
, I had also knowledge of everything that was eatable, and there was a lot edible
in the big garden around the grounds of Sterrenschans. I seemed to know
what wild rye and wheat were, which fruit was edible, which mushrooms were
poisonous. There was a bush with bright red fruits that we definitely had to
stay away from .But somehow or another I knew that the fruits were definitely
not poisonous. And they were really tasty. Since I had eaten it, they had ,
probably with fear and trembling, waited a day and then the bushes were looted.
What was left over was made into jam. The strange thing is that I lost some of
that knowledge after the war and was only returned in my high school years. How
could I, a city kid from Amsterdam and Wenen , know all those things and use it
too?
Cold ,
wetness, stink and fear. The feelings prevail over the war violence.
Why, dammit,
do I not remember how and by we I was
taken away from my father? Or how I was taken away from my mother ? I feel
darkness. Screaming and shouting from every side?
The panic of
then is again totally back. Bugger up all! Leave me alone.
12 September
1992
The past
won’t leave me alone. Now I have started voluntary work in abundance. I speak to a lot of people who want to talk
about the flash that one has seen in me in early news. That was at the
conference ”The hiding child” . That lasted three days , but the first day I
could not handle it, and I left in the afternoon.
Now their
stories are coming out. …. The stories from people that can’t forget how their
friends, and their classmates disappeared. How the rumors about treason and
hiding of teachers and teachers who disappeared and aunts and uncles and so on. Me they had never associated
therewith.
28.
18 September
1992
It's hard to
get hold of this book.I don’t feel physically fit and the doctor won’t allow me
to give blood for the red cross before he has his self-done an examination.
Still I want
to go back. Not to the time of hiding, but to the time before that. What do I
really remember from the time with my mother? Blank memories come up, real
memories!
We lived in
the Vrolikstraat in Amsterdam. I am in the living room playing with my dolls
house with real lights. My father made that. The curtains are closed, the
lights are burning.
In the back
room there is singing with guitar and mandolin en…violin? Austrian (mountain)
songs, Dutch hiking songs, operetta songs. I feel good about it, even though
I'm alone, but with Kareltje- Karlchen will have mentioned him- my big wooden
doll out of Wenen, whose legs moved back and forward when you moved his legs.
When we went for walks he walked beside me, then Mutti or someone else held his
other hand and we waved them back and forth.
Jetje my
neighbor .We play in the garden .Jetjes mother is with my mother. We ran on the
veranda , into the kitchen. But Jetje stepped in the wooden veranda onto a big
nail. I feel sick, because she had so much pain . Typical, such a reaction.
We play at
Jetjes in her house. She has a grandpa, who lives in the back room. One day
grandpa does something “dirty” . He takes his willy out and hold it against me
and Jetje. We were not allowed to talk about it. We found it so interesting,
that straight away we tell it to Jetjes mother…..The next day grandpa is gone
and Mutti wont talk about it.
Auntie Hilda,
Mutti and me walk in the Leidsestraat. Mutti has a yellow dress on with small
blue roses. I am playing hopscotch , pavement on , pavement off and sprain my
ankle. That hurts so much that I nearly faint. Mutti takes me in her arms .
Then I pee on her beautiful new dress and from shock I begin to cry really
hard.
I have warts
under my foot and was with her at the doctor. He burns them away and I
scream out. When that is done , is Mutti
talking with the doctor and I walk around and stand on something that is glass
that cuts my foot open. Mutti was upset and apologized extensively with the
doctor, but does not look at my foot.
With a lot of
kids at the same time we are at a clinic. In the entrance of the door stands a
doctor,who will cut out our tonsils. He gives a speech, where the mothers are.
He promises the kids (I think he overlooks me) a scooter with square wheels, if
they are very sweet.I am furious. I also want a scooter with square wheels, but
he has not promised me anything and I don’t want to go with them in. Without
mother , all doctors and nurses and strange big stools….And PAIN! With force
they opened my mouth, there is pain and blood in my throat. Panic!
Later on I got a present from Mutti, but not a
scooter with square wheels.
The front
room is the children’s room. The curtains, the cushions on the home made
plywood stools, the tablecloth, the curtain for the home made cupboard- everything
is covered in thin light blue material with small yellow and pink flowers. I
have a lot of toys, more than other children. My father makes a lot . I think
that he also made the furniture and the lamp.
But I am
rather at my auntie Jo, who lives behind us and has eight children. There it is
always busy and cozyThat is where I would rather eat, not at home, sometimes
Mutti eats there too.
Looking back,
it seems like I come from far away. Another time, different atmosphere. The noise outside
overwhelms me here. Then the reassuring noise
of the refrigerator takes over.
Back. Other
memories.
Across the
street is a sweet shop. Sometimes I get a whole penny to buy sweets.Then I go
with Jetje or with a girlfriend to look for what I want.
We always go
with a group of children, with a grown up , to the Frobel school. Then we pass
by a wasserete . Mutti is so beautiful, I am so proud when she comes with us.
Or if we go somewhere else. We go out a lot, also on visits.
Memories of
scenery, stage curtains, hollow-sounding voices and ballet practice rooms with
piano music.I am in a ballet group with other little ones But Mutti is
also very musical: she can sing and
dance and loves the theatre…
( Years later
I went with my father on a visit to a family Schubert. They came out Wenen and
knew my mother. And me as a small girl. Their home was a revelation, so
well-known and familiar to me. But the people, Mr. and Mrs. Schubert, I did not
remember.)
Mutti is
proud to make me beautiful. I remember a pink and white woolen skirt with very
nice buttons. A tartan dress of silk with a white lace apron, white silk socks
and black patent leather shoes.I feel the material now as I think about it…..
Images… They
keep coming, tumbling over each other in their haste to reveal their self to
me. I write key words in order not to forget them, not one can escape now, how
they whirl together.
31.
Argument
between my parents. The swing hangs from the doors to the veranda in the back.
They sit together around the table, maybe playing a game- and so I try
to swing that I can catch my father out. That poor sweet man.
Another
vision. I am in a holiday camp in Petten on the sea. Specially set up for the
sickly. I get there a sickness, perhaps nostalgia. It must be winter, a hard
winter. My beautiful Mutti is brought in with bloody legs and lies beside me in
the hospital ward. She has walked
far through deep snow and the hard top
layer has broken her silk stockings and rubbed her legs broken
.But she is with me again. She has to stay in bed longer than me. I don’t
remember any more, apart from that I don’t want to lose sight of her again.
Except when I go to the Frobel school. I made so many nice things and have
brought them home for her: a doily for the tea chest (with the coffee set) made by folding a countless number of times silk paper; and beautiful
things made of wire and colored
beads, such as a swing with side posts and a doll ( with a picture) on it. The
picture I made again in the Martha Foundation , I now remember.
From the
Frobel school , I remember a party. I have to run with a young boy to win a
glass of lemonade .There is two glasses: In one of them is real orangeade, the
other is colored on the inside. I win! And I pick the good glass too. He is
very mad.
A warm spring
morning. The sun has just risen. I stand with Mutti by the Bata. My father
works there. Airplanes fly overhead. Noise , bomb craters .My mother falls to
her knees , throws her hands before her face and begins to scream and cry.
War “Oh no, My God no!” Everywhere
people, everywhere panic. My father? I don’t know. My sweet , beautiful Mutti
is bleeding and crying. In my memory I am completely rigid and only see the
image and hear noise. horrible noise.
32.
Swimming in
th e sports fund bathson the Heiligeweg. I heard later that as a baby I could
swim. But there is panic, as I a toddler climb to the top of the diving board
and was suddenly discovered on the edge
of the shelf.UI was caught by a man. Mutti cried from shock.
We sleep in
the alcove ,the room in between . Beside
the back (living) room frosted glass sliding doors, which could make the
living room bigger ; beside the front
room with a wooden door .On both sides
was a bed.
Mutti often
wears a brooch from the Stefan Church in Vienna, where we must have lived. I
see the colors now before me. I find that the most beautiful thing and I climb
up on her lap often , just to see it.
Vienna. From
Vienna I remember little or nothing. A large, gray, barrack- like building
where all voices sound very hard. A big garden like a park. Or is it a park?
There I also have an Omama, that in my
memory is very big and stately, Many and very big stairs and very high. You
still see that in old films.
As I dive
into the past again without clear memories, at least without images.The feeling
of very fine porcelain The scents, the
scent of earl grey tea ,bergamot, roses, the under scent of certain perfumes, from
freesia’s: That was the scents of Mutti.
I must have
been a smart child. Bilingual, with a large vocabulary in both Dutch as East
German. And with only a faint notion of the dramas that took place around me
and the tension of the impending war. Then it was just very lucky.
33.
And suddenly
it was over.
One of the
last things I remember from the Vrolikstraat, the bomb crater is nearby, at the
corner of Van Woustraat.
19 September
1992
After all
these years, is now (of course completely unjustified, I realize that though)
great anger towards my niece Ilse, her half brother Kurt and half sister
Inge (my cousins ), not even a little
time to share with me .After Vienna- and from there I only have a photograph- I
never saw them again. Anyway Ilse has regular contact with Inge .Or is Hilda, her
mother and my aunt ( Muttis sister) responsible for that? Ilse has stayed in
England at Inge’s and sometimes Inge comes to Amsterdam. Ilse has worked on a
kibbutz. Ilse has kept her mother. Ilse is not to balame , no one is to blame.
These things just happen like that. But she has kept a whole family. I lost
everyone.
34.
Would
her mother not be responsible for the only child of her
sister? She survived, my mother was
killed. Maybe I was not really happy at hers , but I had family. Family in Amsterdam, in ,England, Austria( Vienna) and
Israel . Ilse kept those contacts. I never had them.
Bitterness is
not necessary and not good .But I still have to get rid of it.
Tonight I
read on teletext about the first really
anti-Semitic demonstration in Eastern Europe. And the decision by the Arab
countries to engage in a "holy war" against Serbia (for the Muslims
in Bosnia).
Fear strikes,
Nostradamus was right? Literally, also was the misery in Iraq predicted by him.
In 1994, Europe would be at war with Islam, and warnings would not help.
Wait and watch as Europe and Israel will
perish and America will get involved too late? So then we get World War III.
20 September
1992
Teletext ,
Page 312. Budapest. Tens of thousands of demonstrators against the president
and against the management of the Hungarian television. The Democratic Front
had warned against Jewish power.
Teletext,
page 313.If this "holy war" would continue - there is Iran an army
ready, says teletext- and if only if Saudi Arabia is against, what's going to
happen here? All those tens of thousands of young, rudderless Muslims who are
aware to be Muslims if they want nothing "to do", they will find a
purpose in this so-called holy war? A purpose to live for, an ideal? Ah heaven, then Europe will indeed be
overwhelmed by Islam, but other than
Nostradamus meant . Who predicted that the threat would come from Iran.
35.
There is an
enormous depression coming. I have to see . But what is the usefulness of the past, if there is nothing good to expect from the
future? I wrote that in a poem in 1956, when there was an uprising in Hungary.
Perhaps there is no future to live in
So we almost stand still naturally.
It seems to me, it is
far better to stay
Than to perish in the future.
I'm just here to do something else. Read Paul's
letters. He has everything I write on
the computers , and sends me the prints with a letter. Memories and things that
happen to him now, that never were related to me. About how he and his friends,
shortly after the war, were driven by nerves and panic to cause a massive blow to the garden of the Jewish family of Juultje .How much he regretted it later. How easily
he rolled over the war, his memories are
colored by his awakened wanderers
spirit.
In the newspaper Het Parool from 27 August ( why have
I not read that before now?) writes Chawwa Wijnberg: “The feeling of sadness,
anger and despair, which we (the children) as it were victimized ...)
She forgot to mention the fear and fundamental
loneliness.
I dreamed of a shindig in someone’s room. There was a
beaten up bed.Nobody danced with me, I desperately did my best to look as happy
as the others that were available.I suggested to them that we sit on the bed ,
but they did not want to do that. On leaving, someone showed me out and I just walked outside in the darkness.
Left the others behind me, and they went the other way.
36.
And I woke up
afraid.
And last night I dreamed of earthquakes and noise and
trapped between the people and I could
not go anywhere. I realized in the dream that that was the safest place
to be.
I have written to Ilse , and told her what I can
remember, or thought I could. I have asked her if she can tell me more. Maybe
her mother Hilda has told her things about my mother, my grandparents , about
Vienna. Maybe that will help me to remember things again.
21 September 1992
I want to try to continue. I have yet to discover a wide no man's land between
Mutti and the Martha foundation. I
find it very scary and it's all very murky. If I cannot find it, I must use violence. It wears me out, but also makes me stubborn.
At the beginning of this week I close this book and
send it to Dorine to read. Then after we have spoken about it , I take it back.
24 September 1992
Dorine agreed to once again pick up the image of my
mother. Like that , that is potentially imposed by my father and my family.
And try to find an answer to the question to what
extent it has affected my self-imposed image. And so my life.
Where I'm going and where I come from?
37.
Despite sleeping pills I have not slept in two nights. I'm too busy with voluntary work and
obligations thereabouts, then again, I also feel the desire to let that go and
come to myself. Does not work. Tired,
muscle and bone pain. I get up again at
05:15 and have put on coffee. Pondered
about errors and heartlessness present in others, about shortcomings in my
work. I talk too much. I've never been this way.
39.
October
41.
1 October 1992
I have fallen
into a massive depression and have layed everything (temporarily) down.
And I again feel guilty about that .... I was yesterday during a meeting
sitting at home so nervous that it was not fun anymore. It is necessary to prepare an event for
17 and 18 October, but I stuttered, could not get my words out, belittled
myself and understood little. I
feel spiritually paralyzed me and have pain all over my body. Why? What is
happening to me?
Jessica, my daughter has read the memories to Mutti.
She was happy , she said .It has given
her more information over her unknown grandma and more understanding for me.
4 October 1992
I could not do
anything the last few days. There was actually
so much work to do that I was
torn to continue, between my
desire with this book and my "love and devotion to duty" for the work
that must end 17 December, when the
municipal Platform Global Awareness is installed. All preparations for this swallowed my
time, my energy and my money. I had already given up the trade union work in
the past month, as well as my contacts
with council and commission.
Jessica had warned me that my dive in the past would
take my energy. She seems to have been right. It is still scary and it is still
not known if it is really worth it all:
I, the Jewish middle aged daughter, grew up in a
"Christian" environment, have come during this quest at a point where
I am searching for my Jewish roots. But precisely because of my past I hear,
and I feel, no longer at home in the Jewish community. What the latter may be.
42.
Anyway, here we go: the image I have of my mother. A
real image I have not so clear. A small, muscular woman, slim. And quite striking, very large eyes,
well dressed, sometimes chic. Sometimes happy, sometimes aloof. I don’t remember hug parties, nor things we did together. However, we were inseparable, which is
pretty normal for a single mother with a child.
Yet there must be, outside of the described memory, an
image that appeals to reality. Though
the knowledge from the past (not the
Memories), the fleeing and the fears of
the rising anti-Semitism before the war, persecutions, bring back real memories that I'm mentally
maimed by them. The image stays the same: My beautiful , sweet Mutti.
My father has told me about the fleeing to and from Vienna . He told me
about Hilda , whom we went together to
visit. And
he also told me that, years after the divorce, when he was long
just friends with
"mother" that he still loved
Olga . Her eyes, he could not forget them. At the same time, he really gave me
the picture with a woman, who was immensely irritated by his lack of willpower,
Only in 1963 I was, here, facing my past. I received from the Red Cross proof
of her death.perseverance and ambition. She herself had, after all, despite social opposition,
won gold medals at the Workers' Olympics in Budapest. That were immediately snatched away at
the border control in Germany, was another matter. He, my father had on his
marriage abandoned his studies in state economy to support his family. He could
not find any work in the crisis. For the support he worked in the DUW (social service’s)., but I don’t know if his
marriage was already over or not. That was the picture my father gave.
43.
Although he was a sweet, gentle man, he did not make
it with Olga, who must indeed have possessed so much more perseverance and
rationality. This is clear from what she has achieved in athletics, her
survival instinct, but also from the circles in which she must have been. Artists, theatre, musicians and the likes
of did not fit at all with the soft,
pliant and pure leftist worker boy who was my father.
I actually believe that from Olgas side, that it was a
marriage of rational considerations. However, he was lost from the moment he
saw her. That
he called her “hard” afterwards, I can understand now but it does not change
the image I have of her. That has something of defenselessness.
So far as I remember , we never talked about her in
our family. She is hushed and I was “the
poor small child” . Literally hushed .When I was at my first hiding place , at
the aunt from my father’s side, I must have asked when Mutti was coming back.” Do not complain, we'll see when she
comes back. be quiet, now it should be
over. "
No proof of her existence ever after.
A little understandable when one remembers how it was
at the time. At each address it must
look as if I belonged. And a child who complains about when Mutti was returning, was a danger
for her surroundings. The questions and even the memory was so very
quickly suppressed and eliminated by the mental and physical coercion from
outside. And
the multitude of impressions, all relocations and new environments and the
induced fears, the memories indeed disappeared. Nobody, apart from my father ,
had ever talked with me about my mother. Also after the war. It was- suddenly-
aborted. Only in 1963 was I, suddenly, confronted with my past. I
received from the Red Cross proof of her death. .A “Wiedergutmachungsgeld” from
Germany, which I can use to benefit my family. Only in that time, when I had received that relatively
small amount, I was wondering if there is somewhere maybe someone still alive
who my mother was. Despite
the obituary. Because I had two small children and a million
questions. I looked at every Jewish looking woman – Maybe she was the one? I
wrote to Israel, when I saw on television a woman that I thought looked like
Olga.
44.
As I got older, my feelings denied this
understanding of this.
There is bullying children's game in which the
children stand in a circle with a child in the middle. That one child with a hard push is
hurled to another. After such a shove you try to regain equilibrium, but before
you succeed in it, you get pushed again by another child. When you
think you are standing well
, you
are pushed before you can regain balance. That is the image I
have from my childhood. Once
I was with someone, I could hold someone. That brings a new memory in the
light. Me holding Mutti’s hand, always.
In the tram on her lap, me
doing most of the talking. I belonged
with her, I held on to her. The image I have of myself from earlier years,
after the disappearance of Mutti , is of
that child in the center of the circle.
Here in this falt in Nieuwengein, where I live from
1981, there has been change.
Divorced from my second husband, the children grown
up,I left
my soul in ” prayer” in charity work.
That is also a way of hiding from myself.
But I am
myself, Erica van Beek. A
woman for whom I could respect, despite her bouts of depression, crazy
reactions, and panic states.
There Paul and Dorine have played a big part in.
45.
9 October 1992
Yesterday I started with Dorine the
processing, and we agreed
that they would inquire about my mother
at the State Archives. The next time we will discuss when we will look for Olga
in barracks 41/0.
A picture of me as a toddler with a hat
on, has on the back the year 1939 .I was then four years old and back in
Amsterdam. A
fact that raises no recollection .
46.
Erica in 1939
47.
From Olgas letter from Westerbork to Aunt Hilda, I
took it that they had to report to the prison at the Amstelveensweg, because
she had not sewn but had pinned her star. From there, they should be sent directly to Westerbork
and Auschwitz. When
Olgas sister, my aunt Hilda died, I received from her daughter Ilse, out of her
legacy, a letter and a telegram written from Westerbrok. It was thus that I
finally collapsed and could do nothing
with the feelings that arose.
The telegram from Olga from Westerbrok
The facts as I know them now at a glance:
8 September 1942:
Letter that she is transported to Westerbrok:
10 September 1942:
Telegram from Westerbrok;
14September 1942:
Official date of death in Auschwitz.
48.
The first hiding place:
Bestevaerstraat 19 -high. Before that I was for a time
in the Bellamy- straat, anyway on the 11 August 1942.
Mutti must have disappeared around about my seventh
birthday.
Since that birthday fell on a Saturday (found on the
perpetual calendar) there is to think of a family member , in this case
certainly, that took me in because Olga had to report on Monday, 3 August 1942
at the Amstelveenseweg.
Then, on September 8, she writes that
she's " deported" to Westerbrok. That was a
"Wednesday". The telegram of September 10 was in vain. The next following day that the
train left to Auschwitz was Tuesday 14 September, the same date as her official
date of death! Indeed,
the trains always left on Tuesday?
That can mean two things. The first is that she did
not survive the journey . The second , that she indeed was “murdered” directly
when she arrived. However, it could mean , that she never arrived in Auschwitz
dead or alive….or never even left….
Help. I don’t understand!
Then in the
Bellamystraat…. Was I there for a short time by Hilda and did I
arrive on 11 August 1942 in the
Bestevaerstraat by Marie and Bart? Or at her parents?
In the Simon Sttevinstraat, in my memory a street
behind, I was by Marie and Bart.
Between 11 August 1942 and 15 December 1942, there is
a series of addresses. After the Simon Stevinstraat the Keizergracht. By whom?
After that the Prinsengracht, I also can’t remember . De Eerste
Leliedwarsstraat, in the middle of the Jordaan. A crooked house with sloping
floors.It stood under construction for many years. I remember that I must have been at a
cousin of my father. That
the sloping floor was broken and the furniture too and smelly. Wooden floor and
a damp stinking kitchen. The people there could not do anything about it : The
houses were not maintained. In a room lay a pile of patches or blankets, that
is where I slept. In another room there was a window that looked upon a house,
where Chinese people lived. Sometimes if I look outside and
saw the boys with their beautiful white shirts and their black trousers. I
found them soooo beautiful!
49.
After that in Hoorn , Keern number 32 or 24. A sister
of my father, aunt Bets, married with Aart den Ouden, three children. That was
a real family.I slept with their daughter in one bed. We went after the harvest searching
opium poppy. That was in the Kennemerland. The stubble in the country
short mowed grass caused bleeding legs and feet. How was
the reaction to that? I don’t know anymore. All that we
could find we put in the pants with
elastic in the legs and was given at
“home". Sometimes we kept apples or pears for ourselves and we eat them in
bed.
In the town center was a peacock cage and the school
was nearby.I went to the school with a neighbor boy, whose parents were
informants. This is less of a memory than what I was told later. The Germans
marched by our house, singing ”Auf der Heide bluht ein kleines Blumelein und
dass heisst Erika…” And me, with my
Austrian background pulled on the trouser leg of the sergeant and said: “Ikch
heiss auch Erika.” However,
on the shoulders of the Germans I've been several times to school. Then I was
soon gone from Hoorn.
Then I again ended up with Marie and Bart. In Amsterdam North, Vijfde
Vogelstraat 17. Marie
was hard. Father said that he had fled
from the “Arbeitseinsatz” and came home.
He lived a distance of twenty five meters away and came to visit me, and caught
Marie , just as she was giving me a beating. It must have been a hard quarrel
before he retrieved me and took me to grandpas. I was not allowed to see Marie
again. That was not necessary; I now had grandpa and the two neighbor boys Henk
and Erich. And I had the only happy half a year of my youth, since my mother’s
disappearance.
Marie took revenge and reported me. Probably at the Council for Child
Protection. On the 15 December 1943, a cold, wet, dark day, I was again removed
and brought to the Martha Foundation, then in Nieuwersluis.
Well, there
is a very clear result. That Rivka (Ella) has informed several times to me.
That I have interested! Family, only it never was told me.
What remained
was a lie. And denial. In this case, two different things. But that’s another
story.
I have
immediately written back to Ilse and told her that I have received a letter
from Olly. I hesitate to send her a copy of it.
6 November 1992
Dear Ilse,
I am writing
back straight away. Thank you very much for your letter. Now I can write back
to Schachter. I had already written
evidence about mother's death, but now I can explain to him how it is.
In the meantime
I have received a letter from aunt Olly. I will send you a copy, but hesitate
because she did not- how shall I say this- write so friendly about your mother.
Let me know if you wish to receive the letter-and you can.
As for me, I
want to find the truth. Olly is not so young anymore and it was a hectic time
then. But I must do it with hypotheses. These are often 'ouch'. Would I
however, be reconciled with the past, then I will have to continue for the time
being to write. A journalist friend wants to make a book of my quest. And the
KRO wants to dedicate a radio show to it.
This came about because of ads I've posted in the hope that there are
still people alive who knew Olga .
No, nil comma
zero reactions.
In the book
that I am writing, about the hiding, the Martha Foundation, and the like
are discussed, but mainly my search for
Olga.
Meanwhile I
have, thanks to you, a past back that is mine. A kind of wholeness, whereas
before my life began only in my early adulthood and all that had happened to
"another child named Erica '. You understand? Thanks again.
Wholeheartedly. We are getting closer, you notice that too?
Very cordial
greetings and until the next letter,
Erica
77.
Indeed, I am
aware that, where this story began as a personal process, it is now my mother's story. I think it is about the
fact that I want to know these things, she could have told me if she not- so
young - had been killed. Others, including Jessica, hear the stories of home
and about the past. That is the most normal thing in the world!! ouch- in this
paradise, that is called the
Netherlands.
It's very
selfish and I have never felt so self-centered and prepared. But I consciously
try the pain, the anguish, the misery and the flights and keep fleeing from day
to day all those millions.
Because I
have to live in my life. And so far it has not been.
Tomorrow
firstly I will write back to Schachter
and aunt Olly.
11 November
1992
The anniversary of Jacobs’s death. I am thinking back to that hopeless, terrible
day, six years ago. Looking for the poem that I wrote. And another, that I
wrote as I was mourning for Jacob in 1986.
78.
Jacob
I have known
you- and not known you my child
- I have a
picture of you, that is called Jacob;
And image of
rebellion, fury and suffering
That binds
you to my past.
I have built a picture of you, my child,
That put his
arms around me and held my hand.
Not the boy
who destroyed his life
But
one who finds life fearful and unlivable.
That scared
and angry and on the run
in life never found a shelter
and disbanded
from his fear by his death
I loved you,
my child that we knew.
And
powerless, I watched how you
have wounded
yourself so deadly.
Nieuwegein, 1986
79.
Who wants to
hear
how trumpeter
grief
Who will not
run away
for my
nocturnal crying….
Hear how the
land
shakes under
my feet thumping
looking
crying
Screaming for
my children....
their hunters
continue to
be injured
And flee
for my
boundless grief ...
About him and
his name
can turn
around
Flights as I
approach
come seeking
solace…..
I want their
names
not know him
forget
Never love
again no more
do not be
complicit….
Do not come
closer
I liked you
even trust
Again
memories
should be to
what was….
And who wants
to hear….
80.
11 November,
later
I still have
written the letter to Schachter. With "urgent" on the envelope.
Because in the mailbox was a letter from the 'Division for Personal
Commemoration,' say 'the department Commemoration of Persons ":
"We
propose to inform that one page witness statement to commemorate your loved
ones, family and friends, who lost their lives in the Holocaust, are added.
The Pages of
Testimony will be included in the computer and stored in the Hall of Names at
Yad Vashem. A second notice with the names registered shall be sent to you next
month. "
Yes, hasty
and erroneous data
12 November
1992
If I have
ever had the illusion that humanity has become wiser and better, it is now
absolutely over. At the time of Gorbachev, I still had hope. Ethnic and
nationalist wars that since robbery and especially in the 'civilized' Europe
have broken make me realize that humanity has learned nothing. I have always
expressed the opinion that the "masses" consists of individuals, who
each have their responsibilities with respect to themselves and their fellow
men. I take the view back without extreme bitterness, but with the sad
realization that it was an illusion. The "dumb masses indeed. The masses
seem to have a need for a negative individual, projecting above ground level,
head and shoulders. His pursuit the ideals of the global village? The only
thing that still exists thereof is the data of the news distributionA message
from the newspaper yesterday, a headline: 'Bosnia Muslims are actually
threatened with extinction. ‘
And the world
is watching.
Yesterday I
passed the pieces from my tray from the town hall. And immediately an alarm
bell was raised. For the new municipal
identitieskaart is a counterpart of what the (jew) got on the Ausweiss: an
asterisk with a number (eg * 76 468.) For Moluccans!
'Moluccans'
indeed have a 'special status' in the Netherlands. But the name and picture
together should be sufficient recognition? Along with the smear campaign
against so-called illegal immigrants gives me the conviction that the
"Ausweiss bitte," mandating us of wearing - and showing-
identification at any request is only a matter of time. And then the shift to the
right and nationalism also struck here. Because only 'real' Dutch have a
municipal identification.
Of course I
have taken the necessary steps. Also to get this publicity, but you have to
wait and see how it is picked up and whether one sees the danger.
Below the letter in translation I wrote to
Rabbi Schachter enclosing a copy of Olgas note, her telegram and the evidence
of her death.
11 November1992
Dear Rabbi
Schachter,
My heartfelt thanks
for your letter of 16-10-'92, but above all for your loving attention.
As you can
understand it for me indeed a shock to have read and found out that there is
already a Page. I needed a few days to get over the shock and to discover that
the story in the Page was wrong with the reality.
This morning
I received a note from the 'Division for Personal Commemoration,’ my mother is
registered on the basis of your story. Please, undo, it was too fast, too
hasty. I do not blame you, you were full of good intentions and truly believed
in what you found.
Truth is, I
send you:
1 An almost
illegible note, which my mother wrote on the way to Westerbrok on Wednesday 8
September 1942, to her sister Hilda. The original can be found in the
Resistance Museum in Amsterdam;
2 A copy of a
telegram that my mother sent to her sister from Westerbrok on September 10,
1942. The original of this is found in the Resistance Museum in Amsterdam;
3 An excerpt
from the municipality of Amsterdam, which shows that my mother, Olga Bock, was murdered in
Oswiecim (Auschwitz) in Poland, and that she was the daughter of Jozefa Karpfen
and Armin Bock. Also showing that she had been married to Jacob van Beek, my
father;
4 Finally, a
letter from the Dutch Red Cross information office.
The last two
letters I received, as you can see, already in 1963, when I was married with my first husband. They were the only
evidence, then, that I had, that she had ever lived. Many years later, when my
mother's sister died, I received that note and that telegram. And that was
that. Make from it your own story...
Now, after
receiving your last letter, I tried to get in touch with Ilse, the daughter of
my mother's sister. That sister survived and died about ten years ago. I
translate for you part of the letter I received:*.
Until there
the letter I received from my cousin.
When I
received your letter, I thought that I was crazy or had a wrong picture in my
mind of the past. It took a while before I realized that that was not the case
and that no second Olga Bock existed with the same background. One possibility
was then, that the Israeli cousin had her own story about my mother, which I
discovered, was true, as you see.
As for my father is the following. He was not
a Jew, but he did not get me after the war to take care of me.
*see page 74.
83.
Hilda would
not do that *, as I have discovered. So I had to stay in that very Christian
orphanage until I was 19 years old. And I had to forget everything (had
forgotten all) of my first childhood.
The truth
about my life and that of my mother is really complicated. I have to rediscover my past and my memories now.
That's why I try to write down on that quest, everything about that trip to the
past. A good friend, a journalist, is willing to make a real book. Not to get a
bestseller, but for my children, my ex-husband and my friends: who are
interested in my mental journey.
I hope you that you will give my mother the
ultimate right in the Page, to fill in the new found truth. This letter is the
report for The Hall of Names. I will be very grateful if you would change the
existing one.
A picture of
my mother and me as a little child (I have changed a bit over the past fifty
years) is now re-created and if necessary I will send it to you in due course.
The
unfamiliar uncle or cousin, I will not write, but maybe would you be so kind as
to tell him what I have written?
Finally, I
would like to express my greatest gratitude, and I hope you will write me back.
You are at this moment the thread that connects me to Yad Vashem, the place
where my mother will get a fair and beautiful place, where she is at home.
Yours
sincerely,
Erica
* Or had they
no authorization for that purpose? There is evidence? I could not find any..
84.
13 November
1992
Today the
papers are again full of terrible things that are happening in the former
Yugoslavia. Murders, mutilations, rapes.... How will the survivors continue to
live? Demonic primitiveness still requires an equally primitive response:
Bombard the so-called purified areas where Serbs live alone. A little each day
until they surrender. Naturally, hundreds of innocent will die, but on the
other hand maybe the horror finally ends and the other population group not
only feels avenged, but not otherwise is wiped out and can return to their
place. That is never going to be good between the people and the neighboring
countries. Now if there was only intervention! Before Muslims come to 'help'
from the Middle East. Oh, poor Yugoslavia, what should it be?
In the Netherlands there is still hope left.
Saturday, November 14 at the Tropical Museum in Amsterdam a meeting of the
Labour Party 'adorned' with a pocket
line of AFKA, Anti Fascism Committee Amsterdam, to show that not all the
Netherlands is behind the smear campaign against illegal immigrants.
Good, further
with my mental journey.
14 November
Yet to go
back to yesterday. The meeting of the Labour Party was due to 'circumstances
‘not in Amsterdam but in The Hague. And according to the, I would say,
naturally present ME, there was only fifty autonomists that demonstrated and
therefore naturally were beaten away and had to be arrested.
Fortunately
it penetrates to the media that the smear campaign against illegal immigrants
is wrong. Refugees or not, but everything is lumped together! An embarrassment
for politics? Am I not a voice of the people? Such things affect me deeply!
85.
Following is
the translation of the letter I wrote today to aunt Olly in London. In itself a
partial evaluation, actually only scheduled for late December.
Dear aunt
Olly,
Thank you
very much for your letter. It answered very many questions that I had all my
life. I am sorry that you know so little, but what you do know, brought back so
many memories again and made me aware again of many things.
This is a
very long letter, prepare yourself then for?
Ilse has also
helped me a lot.
I'm going to
tell what I remember, or have come to learn or have read.
My father,
Jaap, who died on 28 November 1976, has always told me that he continued to
love Olga his entire life. In 1938 (of'37), he begged Olga to marry him again,
for her own and my safety. She refused, probably left Vienna when he came there
and told him according to his own words, to marry Hilda, because she would,
with her two children need him a lot more. That would be the reason (can) he
married Hilda, according to him, just to help Hilda and her two children. I
suppose neither Olga nor Jaap knew anything about the fact that you would take her
with her two children to England. As it is told, Jaap went to Amsterdam and
Hilda soon followed. They had both before and during the war, often the same
address, but never lived together.
Olga and I
came back later to Amsterdam. As Hilda told Ilse, still a little
surprised: "She came sailing down
the Danube." Ilse had her own image
(by the way it was talked about)
from the book Uncle Tom's Cabin: Eliza, jumping from ice floe to ice floe on
the Ohio River, to escape the slave trader and to save herself and her child .
86.
It must have
been a very traumatic journey and an escape in the nick of time to Holland.
Jews were then no more allowed public transport, train or bus travel. I have no
memories of that, even though I was there. Never mind. I will leave it at that.
Maybe my fears, panics and bad dreams are the root cause.
When Olga was
taken away in August '42, she assumed that I was safe with Hilda, according to
the note she wrote just before she reached camp Westerbrok. Shortly after began my life as a so-called "Hidden
Child.” There followed a number of addresses, where I, as a Jewish child was
not really welcome. Until I came in the winter of '43 to that very Christian,
very cruel orphanage, where I remained until my nineteenth year. When I was 'free'
from there , I had to my knowledge no
other real family other than my father,
who over the years, faithfully visited me each visiting day. Oh yes, I knew
Aunt Hilda, Louis and Ilse, I had some relatives on Jaap's side, and to kill
some time I had visited them with Jaap (very rarely I had permission to go with
him for a few days in my summer holidays).But there was no family ties,
not with Hilda, nor with Jaap's side. I
also don’t remember anything about the brief encounter with you and Inge. There
must have been from the beginning simply too much sadness, anger and trauma in
me.
Now I have to deal with that past. There is
indeed much to forgive, especially Hilda, who during and after the war
abandoned me .Her child and she were quite safe because she was married to my
father, a non-Jew. Yet Ilse and Hilda sat in Westerbrok for a time, but came
out safely, through that marriage, I think. After the war, Jack and Hilda got
divorced straight away, so she could marry Louis.
The last
eleven years I have been very active for ‘disabled *’ for refugees, gypsies,
for society in all its forms.
87.
As a
volunteer. I had and have no ordinary pension. It is a pension for victims of
persecution, especially Jewish people. Just like my grandmother Joszefa (Ilse
wrote to me about her), a militant woman of the labor movement. I have even
been, for a number of, a member of the Communist Party of the Netherlands,
which no longer exists. I chose the wrong husbands and separated from them. The
wrong lovers and discontinued that relationship again. Now I'm grateful that I
live alone since my now adult daughter Jessica has left home.
Returning to
Hilda: I, but also, Inge and Kurt have her, I think, to forgive, a lot. I will
reach that pointof forgiveness in the near future. I am slightly conscious of
the fact that I'd never have been the same helpful woman, if things had turned
out otherwise. Do you understand what I mean? Life is just the way it is and
I've been through it, for whatever reason. We will have to accept and live our
lives. While the rest of the world is just about on fire. I agree with you,
that it is terrible.
Back to your
letter. I think it was the excuse that
Hilda could not get me back because she had been married to my father. * But I
want to believe that she was unable to bring me up because of everything that
had happened before and maybe Louis did not want me. Ilse has never been able
to understand this and despite her loyalty to her mother, she is in her heart
still angry, about much bigger things, but also because of me. I can understand
.
*however, it
may have been true. Only recently was it publicized in publications that the
Child Protection used that excuse at the time. Better Christian than Jewish,
they found.
88.
Now about
Olga. As I have discovered recently, the
following things happened:
-On September
8, 1942 she was released from prison in Amsterdam, where she was detained for
the simple fact that her 'star' was pinned instead of sewn. The Germans are
still very 'gründlich' as you know.
-On September
10 she sent a telegram to Hilda from
Westerbrok to send her the Aryan papers of Jack, but it was too late,
because
- On
September 11 '42 she died in Auschwitz. The journey lasted three days.
This is true
according to all the information that I have, official and informal. So that
should be accepted. She fortunately only suffered for a short time. And now I
am able to bury her, to give her a grave and a Page of Testimony at Yad Vashem
in the Hall of Names in Jerusalem, for the victims of the Holocaust. And now I
am able to remember my mother and some of my childhood. That heals me in a way;
it makes me whole, so to speak. A woman with a past that I previously could not
remember because of the terrible things that had happened. With "Today"
writing, thinking and remembering. And with a future, long or short, but worth
living.
That is what
I mean by ‘whole’. And perhaps cured, healed, through that journey into the
past itself. And at my age, 57 years old!
Only that
part of Hilda keeps crossing my mind. I'll have to think over and over, until I
can forgive her. Can you understand that? Oh yes, I have still something to
ask.
From what
Jaap has told me about Olga, about you and about Vienna, I always understood
that you and Olga were great friends.
89.
Maybe indeed
just because of the sports club, as you wrote. But really not above that level?
How is it that Jaap admired you so much, almost worshiped you? Only because of
your part in this tragedy in Vienna? Or because you were good friends with Olga
and her family? Her best friend, whom she trusted, like Hilda trusted in Olga?
Maybe Hilda was very much a dependent, very childlike and she could not make
decisions for herself or defend herself? You and Olga must have been strong
personalities, you were well-qualified sportswomen. Maybe she felt more or less
forced into what she did, first by Olga and others, later by Lois. My father
had therein little to say. It would explain a lot of things, if that was so.
Today,
everywhere with wars and misery in the world and especially in Eastern Europe,
with refugees, I am also not able to let
any of them stay in my house, legal or illegal. It would break me. Do
you understand what I'm saying? Oh, I want to reach that point of forgiveness!
Would you
please write me back? Even if you think you cannot really tell me anything of
what happened or cannot help me further.
Until then,
I'm still sincerely yours,
Erica
15 November
1992
So, that has
put everything nicely in a list. Albeit superficial , about my lovers is not
quite honest .Only one of them was a jerk and I realized that almost too late.
The one that I cannot mention here, still has a big place in my heart. Life
itself made and end to our relationship. And Paul, oh well. I loved him very
much, but we did not fit spiritually together.
90.
My frustrated soul could not bear his
affection towards his ex-wife and ex-girlfriends. Superficially seen, pure
jealousy. But it was not that alone. In a love relationship, I should feel
perfectly safe, and that I was not. I always enjoyed what he did, his writing
and his poetry; have learned everything I know of graphic art from him. But a
relationship, a lasting bond of love was something impossible. Fortunately, we
can now be close friends. Now I trust him so much that I have asked him to help
make this book.
A little
reminder comes up with a few notes during commercials.
Kommt ein Vogel geflogen
Setzt sich nieder auf mein Fuss
Hat ein Breifel in sein Schnabel
Von der Mutti ein Gruss
Leiber Vogel fleig weiter
Nimm ein Kuss mit und ein Gruss
Denn ich kann dich nicht begleiten
Weil ich hier bleiben muss
En dan
Hoppe hoppe reite
Wer da fallt der schreit er
Fallt er in den Graben
Fressen ihn die Raben
Fallt er in den Plumpf Macht der
Reiter ‘Humpf’
There will
sometime come back more songs. It shows that as a child I had singing and music
played to me. About that fact itself I remember nothing. At the Mulo we learned from our German
teacher songs like ‘Das Standchen’ from Schubert and Weihnachtslieder as ‘Schlaf wohl, du susser kleine du' that I
knew how to play at once and that just
came to my mind now. It was already in there! Strange, that it just comes to
mind now. Hey Erica, remain rational
91.
I have given
myself a bunch of phlox as a gift. It smells overwhelming. It is mid-November;
imagine it, an engine will not start from the cold and damp. I sit with my butt
almost touching the heater. Behind my back, it is almost winter and my nose
smells mid-summer. Crazy huh? That is only in this crazy frog country.
17 November
1992
Today was
again a puzzle of the past. First with
Dorine then later with Elma.
It is
impossible to continue to do this rationally. My throat is tight and my head is
spinning still. Tonight my girlfriend An was here play a game of dice. I've kept it inside until
now, a quarter past twelve at night.
Dorine and I
went back to two key questions:
1. How did Olga end up in jail? And
2. Hilda, with some difficulty could she
have kept me?
Olga was not
the type, that has now become clear that
would report under orders. It is possible that Hilda, Olga and I walked on the
street and were arrested by the (Dutch) police officer, if only because of the
stars. That Olga was picked from the street because her star was pinned. The
note makes it clear that Hilda knew! That makes Elma’s suggestion actually a
little off, that Olga was alone on the street. In the circuit to which Olga had
gathered around her there were only Jews (the names Schubert, mentioned
earlier, and Hirsch came back in my mind). They may have been someone else
walking in the street, who could have
escaped it and warned Hilda – at Olga’s
request. But the most likely explanation is still the first. They still had to
get their quantum of Jews? And she sat in a Dutch house of detention on the
Amstelveenseweg. It was at a time in the beginning of the straatrazzias, before
entire streets were taken away. Imagine how that happened. That I myself have
no reminder of that event, says nothing. Too traumatic things, at least to
me, are well shielded. But my heart is
pounding at this moment again from the fear: the most familiar and unwelcome
feeling of my life.
92.
Olga was
picked up by a Dutch policeman. They still had to get their quantum Jews? And
she sat in a Dutch house of detention on the Amstelveenseweg. It was in the
beginning of the street raids, before whole streets were picked up.
Imagine how that happened. That I myself
have no reminder of that event, says nothing. Too traumatic things, at least to
me, are well shielded. But my heart is pounding at the same time again of fear:
the most familiar and unwelcome feeling of my life.
Maybe I'll
get to do regression hypnosis before this book is finished. For all these
things to really face definitely.
Hilda again- according to Dorine and Elma
it is not impossible that Hilda was
really not assigned me by the OPK
(commission War Foster children) *. Because they thought that I was better off
at the Martha foundation than my own familiar family, who were not Christian.
And by a 'Pulse' had nothing more and had to start all over again. Hilda’s
guilt to Olga and later to me, rightly or wrongly - that I have no judgment on
may have meant that she later has not looked back at me. But also her character
and Louis could have contributed. I simply could not see into her heart and she
did not speak. In the next letter I write I will ask this of Aunt Olly and
Ilse. Hilda they barely knew, of course, I'm not sure if she made real trouble
for me. But those very "Christian" ladies and gentlemen of the OPK
and Child Protection Agency I can well imagine, there you need only to turn to
the book of Elma. If Hilda approached the Jewish members of the OPK, also
remains a mystery. For eternity. Okay, I want to give her the benefit of the
doubt; she has not had it so easy.
* A committee
consisting of mainly non-Jewish, very Christian people.
93.
Yet..... Why?
But that's
what life is sometimes, Erica. Tomorrow I will call Hedda van Gennep for more
background information on those months in '42.
A comforting
word for tonight, tomorrow is my daughter here to eat and we go happily to the
world shop, to buy groceries.
18 November
1992
My daughter
now has read everything and actually without comment laid down the books.
I see how
important I think how she experiences it. Well, for her it is the history, the
intricate story of her mother's childhood and family. She finds it, like
Dorine, that I am changing throughout the process. I myself don’t have that
feeling yet, though I hope that it comes. Apart from Dorine I still cannot
really talk about it. It is, really complicated and the distance remains.
A result must
be, that I learn to trust again. And not to build a facade of self-awareness
and self-confidence in my personal contacts. With Dorine I can let go of it,
proud and happy with what I do and did and have achieved. With others I can
never talk about it, if it concerns me at least. About the work I did and do I
myself feel good, but I always feel as a sort of middleman and know exactly who
does things better. It has for example resulted in the identification of the
appropriate chairman of foundation * Property, which actually does it better
than I would ever do it. Or initiating and defending things that I really believed
in, but where others had to play the responsible role. Further I stay humble in the background, , and allow others the honor
that I get sometimes.
*An
organization for the sole purpose of obtaining its own global center.
Am I chaotic-
still- to a demanding task with responsibility for me to take? Or am I just
"shy"?
94.
Put me in a
room with eight hundred anonymous, it goes well. But personal contacts, with
all the warmth I feel for those people. I often hyper- ventilate. And I notice
that only when I am alone again. I realize it's not just a matter of
misanthropy, despite all the social skill.
The underlying cause is distrust in honesty of
others towards me. A wrong expression, glance or a curt answer, and I am gone.
Feel (again) rejected. Something from earlier time. I distrust such a person
for a very long time. Uncertainty. Anxiety. Fear that they see through me. That
is why I seek the attack: If you think "That man is crazy," I am at
that time also. But it passes by itself.
The knowledge
of the past, of all that misery, leading to fear, significant uncertainty,
anxiety, that leads to depression does not help. It realized that again today.
Will that
also get better? It hinders my real development; it keeps me in second or third
place. Not that I'm ambitious. But it's a false modesty, and resulting from
fear to really stand out. It's something from the hiding and the Martha
Foundation. How do you overcome something like this? and is that really
necessary? Am I not so terribly tired of that eternal struggle with myself,
that I see ghosts? And am I not ready to take a step back and not take on
challenges or cross barriers anymore? That is the easy path. No fear of people,
personal contacts with the rest of the "family," which are not going
well currently. And no friends? I surely think to have. How uncertain and tense
that I am. It's not a solution, to become a nun? A hermit? Just now that I'm
complete? But what and how?
95.
I not called Hedda van Gennep yet. Fear, like
with Elma, there again those fears. It was long before I was through that with
Elma, too long. How is it that I do not have that with Dorine? I then stay
rational? In the time.
I myself
think that it might have to do with being prepared. You do not feel robbed,
despite your questions.
Today
Memorboek has arrived. ‘The plate’s atlas of the life of Jews in the
Netherlands from the Middle Ages until 1940’. A book almost as large and as
thick as the King James bible. All the pages reveal that this history is also
mine. I despite my not – believing but still a real Jew, unlike, yes, then
what? That I'm closer to that side than the Dutch side that represents my
father. Not so crazy, apart from the biological provability, to be a child of a
Jewish mother still being Jewish!
I made it
again today. In a regional meeting of the Association of Dutch Municipalities
over municipal global policy. I suddenly got the economist Adam Smith (right
and pure capitalist) under my nose pushed through by a VVD lady: "The
public interest is most profitably encouraged where each individual can freely
pursue his own interests."
I fumed with
rage, literally. So the world is not like that. The law of the jungle prevails
and only the strong will always be at the expense of the weak, which will never
be unimpeded or even could aspire. Think about this "Global Village,"
which is our world. I ask her this, as controlled as possible, 'How big - do
you think - is the percentage of people in our ‘Global Village ', that can
freely pursue their own interests? And is that – ethically speaking -own
interest not only appropriate to the smallest common denominator?'
She did not
answer, but came afterwards to me to talk about it. I said- it was in the
meeting a municipal global policy, east- west and north-south relations - East
and West should never meet here because she was a follower of Adam Smith and I
of Marx.
96.
Again there was silence, and then she said:
"But that does not mean that we have to hate each other, right?" No
it does not, but friends? At such a moment I feel again at one with the
persecuted, the oppressed, that is where I belong. Among the Jews, the Jewish
Marx, as well, if I'm honest, all oppressed peoples that come up in revolt who
flash through my mind.
Links dead? No, but left and right do not let
the back of their tongue be seen, in order not to arouse resistance? Or are we
becoming a- political?
I should in the future be more wary of the
individual motives and self-interest, which should be pursued because in the
approach of the right it cannot go differently in practice, than at the expense
of the oppressed, in my feeling. The making of a new political awareness?
Hey discovery?
Sticking to
the old values, which I - unconsciously have ingested and have tested the
breast milk and found to be correct in my adult life, Jewish huh? This is ebbing my anger.
Every day a
thread is a shirt sleeve in the year.
20 November
1992
I was putting
away my cart. An elderly man was looking about in a panic. I had seen him
before in the store when I was picking out Sharon fruit and he wanted to know
what kind of fruit it was.
It turned out that he had lost his bag of
groceries. Just put down to clear away the trolley.
97.
My
presumption that one of the clerks had taken the bag to the office, proved
correct. Radiant he appeared moments later with his bag. I had waited for the
results. He said that this was the third time and I warned him not to put down
his messages unattended anywhere. Anyway, I thought I'd go now, good evening
sir. My attitude turned out, in the mall, to make a volcano of misery. He had
been in a Japanese POW camp and was badly beaten. He had never seen his father and mother again. And
when he had found his brother, he also appeared to have died. Terrible, but he
had also been married for more than forty years and also his wife had died five
years ago. He had remarried and his second wife worked very long days so he did
the housework and shopping. A whole life just popped out there. I felt so
terribly small, to see such a man wipe away his tears. I should have left
earlier, but had to do with him. He also had a war pension, and ... Well ...
How do you make something like that loose?
21 November
1992
Today a
Womans Workshop by Women in Peace in Cunera. A long day over the former
Yugoslavia, the war in Bosnia. I had in my workshop a group leader a former Yugoslav. Can you imagine such a
thing.... they can never return. Lived here now for eight years. Family:
Bosnians, Serbs and Croats, both Christians (Orthodox and Catholic) as well as
Muslims. Everyone fought against everyone. Who is not dead or wounded, has
deserted spouse and family. The frenzy of lust, macho men that bring resentment
up thirteen centuries to find alibis for their bloodlust. The male scientists
that sit at the top, not politicians, along with the military, unscrupulous
murderers than anyone else in the world after Hitler. Those men. That anger in
me. I must do something with it.
98.
In the
plenary session an appeal was made to the existing female MPs to accommodate
orphans and children of Serbian raped women in Dutch homes. That made that I,
no microphone, shouted: "And what when those children grow up?" At
first it did not go down well, but later, at the end, when I went to say
goodbye to the chairman jantien Achtseribbe, she revealed that she and Leoni
Spikes had understood me very well. They will try to keep the kids there.
Jantien told me that she was married to a Jewish man (I had my star on) and
understood me. What was somewhere in the back of my mind for a while, I
realized when I was in the rain bringing a few letters to the mailbox.
My father
told me; long ago that Olga had come for the first time to the Netherlands to
find work. I do not know whether she had any qualifications. Maybe she was just
very good at sports, who knows. So she came to The Hague, where a couple had
'hired' her, perhaps as a housekeeper like Olly, or a maid. She therefore came
as "illegal," for economic reasons here.
That night
the "Mr. and Mrs." Said that she must make herself beautiful, because
they would receive visitors. One way or another, she realized that she had not
come to an ordinary house, but a closed brothel and she managed to escape
through a window. She must have already known my father. How? Through a
socialist youth group? Or perhaps through international exchange, so then not
"illegal"? At least she had fled (already) from The Hague to
Amsterdam, to my father or to other members of that group. Shortly thereafter
she became naturalized by marrying my father.
That was on
18 October 1933.
On 1 August
1935 I was born and in the beginning of '36, she must have returned from Vienna
with me. Until autumn and winter 1938, witnessed the photos, in winter clothing
which were taken in Oosterpark or Sarphatipark in Amsterdam.
99.
Between
August '35 and Fall '38 they must therefore have been divorced, when Jaap could
marry in Vienna Hilda. Olly can now write that they did not know whether my
parents were then divorced, but my father certainly was not a bigamist.
Besides, the story is in that regard is clear enough. Moreover, I have a lawyer
and attorney, Plantage Middenlaan 88, in the center of Amsterdam, with a
telephone number. Probably the divorce lawyer from when we were still living in
the Czar Peter Street. So close by.
Another
couple of links to the chain. Or beads on the cord? We are now waiting for the
letter, which has to come from Aunt Olly.
What else do
I need to get past some of letting myself be? Not everything has been worked
out, nor on paper or in my head.
100.
Erica in
Amsterdam
101.
The scrap of
paper from Mr. Cooper
102.
The two
issues from my earliest childhood are still the flight from Vienna to
Amsterdam, and the abrupt divorce of my mother.
From the
time, to the end of the hiding I can figure out the facts, which were a
predominant feeling of darkness and cold. Except for a few sunny memories from
Hoorn. The Martha Foundation, surely in Nieuwersluis has certainly brought
memories above which all the children of that time living in the west of the country must have had. And
besides that also the memories of the
house itself, the garden with its, lightning struck cedar, the lawn by the
pond, where we caught and made frogs 'tame', where we made from reed, skirts.
The owner and
his wife, who returned to their own country seat after the war, I visited
sometime around '85, to seek the past in a first attempt. They were old and
then accused me (!) that we, the children of the war had made a hole in their
hedge and that hedge was never properly mended. That was that. I had no
opportunity to see something of the house or the garden, but a weak cup of
coffee and a biscuit. Very genteel poverty.
Martha
Foundation in Alphen: a lot beatings, punishment and tasks, surviving
unconsciously, belittling and never being the best of the class. In the group I
was the worst and slowest, especially at stopping socks and knitting worsted
stockings. 'Snail' van Beek, apparently no one cared anything about her,
according to stories I heard decades later.
Yet also some
nice memories: I told ghost stories, later, to my peers, when we were in bed
and had to be quiet. I taught them dances and was very creative with beautiful
pieces of material and cardboard and paper, for example, I made diadems for the
hair. The kindergarten, how is it possible, nevertheless it bore its fruit. In
the memories of others I was a very serious, rarely smiling girl.
In my early
memory games pink rubies (or what I mistook thereof) encased in a brooch in the
shape of a bouquet, played a role.
103.
Last week
there was an art and curio market here, striking, especially as art deco
porcelain and old dusty materials evoke nostalgic feelings in me. And by one
stall there was a brooch that did not belong there. Strasz pink rhinestones, a
bouquet with blackened metal and bronze-colored stalks. I loved it; it called a
lot of old, good feelings awake. But it was expensive at fifty guilders. I
lingered at the booth, ostensibly to look at other things. The salesman then
said suddenly, "Good lady, for ten guilders, then." Well, I got it
and am still happy with it, though it is perhaps not even worth the tenner.
Every time I see that brioche, I think of the pink rubies, which I had found as
a child so lovely. I have placed it on the list with my mother’s photo.
Yesterday I
was in a curio shop in Utrecht and for
five guilders I bought a very old book. A
probably first published in Dutch version of the book by
Beecher Stowe: The negerhut. A translation of Uncle Tom's cabin. With the original engravings "to the twentieth
American printing from the English translation." On page 59 the engraving
with Eliza, fleeing across the ice! A publication of the Gebr. E. and M. Cohen, Amsterdam.
24 November
1992
I'm too
impatient and thereby make the receipt of the facts more important than their
processing. Certainly in terms of my own life. I'm still waiting for three
drawn lines:
1. Answer
from Jerusalem;
2 Answer from
London;
3 KRO radio
with Kalien Blondes.
A fourth,
entirely in the background hit point, a new appointment with Margreet about
the Martha - Foundation.
Meanwhile, I
am again eager to take action. In the Platform Modiale Awareness. With an
action for the former Yugoslavia, where
I have plotted the lines. I will convene a meeting to do something on
behalf of AFKIN* and the Federal Food Bond attracts harder: Women Committee,
work group "International Solidarity."
I'm going to
start another book, where I can write about my work now to keep everything in
perspective, only for myself.
Why am I
still doing all this? Why do I not live a good life with my small pension, like
other people? Come on, I know the answer after all. If I was brought up as most
people with the same background, in the safe bosom of a loving family, I was
maybe barely aware of a different world than my little safe world.
It's just my
own traumatic life that has made me aware of and empathetic to the trauma, the
fears, and the world of others. And if I can do something with it, for example
by writing about it, then surely that is a bonus? Even though I sometimes get
the feeling I am found to be a little
crazy, a voice in the wilderness. But if I keep quiet, I feel indeed
responsible. As with writers, journalists, protest singers and artists I have
my own way to express my dismay about the horrors of our time. And maybe too
emotional, but that is the way I happen to be.
26 November
Dorine
called. In the form of Yad Vashem was indeed stated in Hebrew "Olga Bock,
house wife, two children, shot in the street by a German officer because she
did not have her star on. In Amsterdam. Married name and name of parents
unknown. "
Tragically,
so many inaccuracies!
Well, Olly
knew even better than I was saved by nuns! How nameless and unwittingly can a
person live and die! Dear Mutti that after fifty years of your life and death
I can give you a name! Is that not a
miracle?
* The
anti-fascist committee of Nieuwengein
105.
Tonight I
find the courage to call Hedda van Gennep. She confirmed Elmas suspicion that
Olga was alone when she was arrested. And that the Dutch police or the home
front did it. She has seen it happen, that she and her mother were arrested and
her mother was beaten in the street because she was wearing a box for her star.
By Nederlanders- in uniform!
So.... I have
never taken leave or said goodbye. Pfff ... and Mutti was gone.
And then my
daughter Jessica came bye, for a quick cup of coffee.
Hedda gave me
the telephone number of the National Institute for War Documentation. When Olga
was arrested and held prisoner and deported to Westerbork, I can maybe find
something about it there.
Today I
submitted a proposal for the Platform Global Awareness on support actions for
Bosnia. An amount per capita for joint financial operations and public action,
for games, work and labor for the Yugoslav displaced centers. Who are bored
silly, they do not speak our language, sit together and the only distraction
they have is the TV that news from home will bring, in their language. I wonder
if mayor Laan will positively pick this up. That was point 2. Point 1 is
realized on 10 December, and next week, Ad, a good friend, is here with me and
we will work on the content of the magazine Global, the periodical that the platform are going to send out around 15
December.
This weekend to realize point three!
106.
With the 'reconstruction' of my book case I
come again across the white ceramic jar with lid, wherein sits a packed piece
of stone from Auschwitz, that a friend of Renco, my ex-husband, specially
brought for me. That now can get an honorary place.
Will I be
able once again to visit there, as in Vienna, or at Yad Vashem, there to find
my mother's name?
First search
in Westerbrok barracks 41/0.
Bring
telegram.
And fetch the
photo of Olga and me at the photographer.
27 November
1992
The
photograph is collected. The price was 90% better than expected, the print was
disappointing. A bit flat and smooth compared with the yellowed original. Too
bad, but she seems to look younger in it though.
Surprise!
Paul was suddenly in front of me; he came for the second book. It was fine,
again to exchange so many things with him. There remains much old camaraderie.
He has grown and now goes (a little) in depth; even with emotions he dares to
talk about and show a bit. Something where he used to be closed about and a
thunder cloud formed over him, "Life is good, right?" He is a
complete man to be. And so I should prefer him throughout.
We also
talked about the reason for writing. Identity crisis? Yeah, maybe but I had no
feel for my identity. And when we entered into a relationship, he wanted me
holding that identity, gave no meetings or work to be with him. That would
oppress him. No, now I understand that.
What am I
still glad that we can talk and write all about these misunderstandings. Now I
also told him that it was apparently still my nature to efface myself away for
the man I loved. And that was a huge threat to the adventurer who Paul wants to
be.
107.
I thought it
was not so much a question of identity, but also and above all that I no longer
came out after Elma’s book and the conference ‘The hiding child,’ to finally do
and want to know the unwitting and the
unsaid things from the past and from to speak, albeit on paper. This quest for
knowledge and words became the mission of my life. More important to me than
anything I did earlier in my life for that unconscious burden I had to explain.
And previously used to hide behind for intimacy behind a so transparent wall.
Now I can
talk, I can tell Paul all. There's a little sadness, because I could not
before. Now he could understand why I was how I was. But would he though have
coped? I do not think so.
Regarding the
OPK where Elma wrote about: there is a note found in an archive box from the
Martha foundation, which said that the Germans gave permission to take me in at
the Martha foundation. That could, to me it is clear, also have been falsified
by the "resistance", to let me be safe hiding there. Finally there
were more Jewish children.
More research necessary.
30 November
1992
The RIOD *
called. Annemiek van Boxmeer. She has heard the whole story, but already knows
that there is no available data on the way my mother was arrested, the time she
has sat and so forth. All details of the houses of detention in Amsterdam from
the war are now destroyed. This also means that no Dutch police man has become
accountable for his conduct in the war. I will send a letter to Mrs van Boxmeer with all the relevant
information about my mother and she will very carefully look at what data
whatsoever.
*National
Institute for War Documentation
108.
In Westerbrok, she said, are found personal
things of the people that were there. I do not think however that I will find
anything there; she was there only three days.
By RIOD it is maybe also possible to find out how she died: on the
train, on arrival or in the gas chamber. On the note that was found at the Free
University for my inclusion at the Martha foundation: they consider it quite
possible that it was falsified by the resistance. But I have to search that out
at the university.
Moreover, I
am this weekend truly active for society. I have written participation notes
for Wednesday, December 2nd in the ABZ- committee (of Administrative Affairs)
and therefore will speak about the municipal identity card. Moluccans will be
put separately therein. I do not agree to that and just cannot! I will try to stop it.
And there is
a silent vigil scheduled on December 24 because of the smear campaign against
illegal immigrants, where a piece I wrote will appear in the Molenkruier, our house-to-house newspaper.
I have also
already the participate notes in January, the police report will be addressed
in the ABZ- Commisssion. Wow ... now nothing more please.
109.
December
110.
111.
1 December
1992
Yesterday I
talked to Elma. I have found at the
Nieuwengeinse recycling center New Work, two books that I thought would be
something for her. If she, as a journalist, needs for investigations or needs
old newspaper photographs, Our Beautiful Life, 100 years newspaper photographs
(Dutch) and a visual report with newspaper pictures of the great woman strike
on 8 March '81 may be useful. She is, I believe, happy with them. Next week I
will bring them.
Elma said something that has stuck: I would
have to look Olly up in London personally. I can still do that, but I feel a
threshold. In a letter I can confront her with the past, but can I do that in
person? And then, I would see it as climbing a mountain. The night before I
dreamed of her and saw her as an old lady suffering with swollen legs. She is
no longer so hardy, she needs time. To write back. So I interpreted the dream
for myself.
I have
gotten from New Work also a book of
Meyer Sluyser that I did not yet have :
There is growing grass in Weesperstraat and Leonard de Vries: Chaverien, is that a children's book?
I will hear
from Dorine if the library of the JMW (Jewish Social Work) has interest in
them. No mail from abroad.
3 December
1992
For a few
days I'm overly nervous again. Not just because of the participation in the
evening yesterday ABZ * - commission over the identity card of the Dutch
Municipalities. I was sure of my case and have also been vindicated. That card
is not, at least for now, going ahead!
* General
Administrative Affairs
112.
Where from then? Afraid because I go against
the established order? Mayor Laan personally assured me about that matter. Why
then? The weather, the high moon, the constant low pressure area? Causes that
are mentioned more frequently in the past.
When Flik was
mayor here, I did open my mouth as needed. He took me quite seriously and I had
forgotten that I now have good-will on the city council. But that may not be
the only reason for my stress.
Perhaps
waiting for an answer from London? If that still will come? One reason to
consider sending a postcard about it?
No post from London.
No post from Israel.
8 December
1992
Finally! Post
from London and from Jerusalem!
The last
pieces of the puzzle begin to fall into place. Tomorrow I will tell you
everything. Now just as the overriding emotion when I read the translation of
the registration of Yad Vashem. "I ask you to give the survivor a"
posthumous citizenship "of the state of Israel, the undetachable sign of
solidarity with the Jewish people." She belongs there. I belong there.
Never before have I felt so Jewish. At heart and inseparably attached. Even
though the fact that the only attachment is to the JMW and Dorine, who let me
feel through the years that I belong. With no family, I am more a part than
with my children. Still I belong, with the Jewish people for centuries and until
the end of time.
It became
just too difficult, there were tears.
Mutti, you're
nearly home. Then you may rest in peace
and this task is accomplished. "Ein schon Leich '* is made, a beautiful
funeral. Who knows, I may be I will bring you. And otherwise I will visit you
in Jerusalem at Yad Vashem. It is almost 1993, and since I do not speak Hebrew
nor ever observed the Jewish calendar, I raise my glass of herbal tea and say,
"See you next year in Jerusalem."
113
9 December
1992
Now it will
begin with the letters from Aunt Olly and Rabbi Schachter. I will start with
the second. The first is so difficult, so traumatic, that I have read it bit by
bit. And yet still I collapsed.... Sick with the shock, first with anger, a lot
of grief and rebellion later. I'll be back to the translation, if I can muster
up the strength today.
Later that
day. Rabbi Schachter writes:
Dear Mrs. Van
Beek,
I was on a
visit abroad, hence the delayed response.
I was very
touched by your thoroughness and your desire to correct the registration of the
memoir, while my concern was not to further traumatize and bring you in touch
with family.
I enclose
some forms for you to register your mother and possibly other family. It will
be clear that we cannot destroy completed prior Pages of Testimony, we can add
a memo or note there with a reference to the 'added Pages in 1992, for example,
which will lead to your corrected Pages.
Fill in the
form attached, please; address it to me so that I can add the Red Cross letter
and your letter there when I have received them.
Yours
sincerely,
Rabbi J Schachter '
* Yiddish
114
The form is
filled in; I just need to wait a few days for a small copy of the photograph of
Olga and me to send.
And now,
there is no escape: the letter from Aunt Olly.
Dear Erica,
I wish I
could answer questions, but maybe at my age of 85 I forget a lot, or I did not
know a lot of things when they happened. I'm surprised your father seems to
have known me. I've never met him! Olga was really no more than a colleague of
the "Arbeiter Turn Verrein. She walked to Holland , I believe, before
Hitler's woes began in Vienna? Are you born in Holland? I was so happy to meet
here, Miss Palmer, a lady who wanted to guarantee my parents, Hilda and her two
children! But Hilda preferred to marry Jaap and go to Holland, Instead of
becoming a maid servant like me , and the children arrived with a
Kindertransport 'here and lived with an English couple. It took ten months
before I was given Inge to stay here with my parents and later with me. I do
not know whether Ilse knows these facts, but do not tell her, please.
Another fact
is that Olga BORROWED the jacket with the star pinned from Hilda. It was
Hilda’s cloak! I hope Ilsa and Inge never hear this. Please, let them never
know!
Erica, please
try to forget what has happened. Forget and forgive!!
I admire you
for.....
Furthermore,
I cannot go now.....
So this was
the big secret that has remained hidden for fifty years. Olga had worn Hilda’s
jacket briefly.... and she was gone.
115
And the guilt
and shame later on have assaulted Ilse and me.
Fifty years!
Fifty years straight it was hushed, nobody wanted to talk about my mother with
me, everyone has told me to leave the past alone. Also to Ilse. She would’ give
her mother sorrow ‘by asking questions. No, she would know the secret and maybe
tell me. That shame, guilt, we have carried our whole life, we did not know
what!
That anger
over the fate unknown, but no less felt, has given me and Ilse in our
adulthood, crisis dragged into crisis. How do you translate the moaning, the
pain that is felt in your head to your toes, the flow of adrenaline, which can
destroy your body, into words! Give me those WORDS!!
Hilda had
thus lost her cloak, the cloak that killed my mother, and that fifty years long
has covered everything, even my life.
Tell me how I
translate this literal pain in written sentences and I'll write a book thicker
than Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses and heavier than the Torah and the State
bible together.
How do I make
the story in question to look like something that remains credible for myself?
Here it looks like a bad novel, with fictional personalities. But it's true. It
really happened! This was my life. And that of my mother.
I have to
pick myself back together. And continue to write.
For hours I
postponed it. I have tried everything: telephone calls, including Paul, talked
to Jessica, lounging before the TV, to come to my senses. With Dorine yesterday
I tried to place it in perspective in the context of that time, especially into
perspective...
Same day,
very late. Now I finish the letter of Olly.
116
I admire you
because you have led such a strong, useful life and are still so helpful. That
must have been partly because of your Christian education. *
I have
nothing to forgive Hilda of. After my
visit with Inge to Holland Hilda wanted
Inge and Kurti to live with her,
and Louis, with whom she was not married at the time. He must have been a good,
decent man, that he not only accepted Ilse, but also to take the two children
in. To help her, he even married her. I begged Hilda to be allowed to keep Inge
with me for two years so she could finish her education . Hilda refused that.
In any case, it seems that she gave up the
struggle for the children, including the conflict with the Jewish refugees
commitee that protected the children. And nobody saw or heard anything about it
afterwards .....
Yes, Erica,
the bitter times that you have gone through in your life have made you what you
are now. A brave, compassionate person. Try not to think of the past; enjoy
your still relatively comfortable life
now, as I do. I try not to take note of what is happening around me in the
world (I know that's very selfish, but in my 85 years I have no more fighting
spirit in me). I live with my cat Shelly quite satisfied, waiting for Inge's
weekly letter. I hope that the treatment of Allen (Inge's husband) is helping
to fight his cancer. He recently had an operation and is doing well and
hopefully for quite a long time. Their three daughters live in England, but I
only see Sara occasionally. Kate lives in Sheffield, so quite far away. I
rarely see her. Helen shows no interest in contact with me. I have not seen her
since my eightieth birthday.
Well, dear,
you do well. Do not think too much about what has happened and make the best of
life. All good wishes,
Aunt Olly
* How did she
work that out?
117
Well, all
good spirits, help me! What should I answer the old lady? She means it
apparently so well; all my questions about my mother, she has indeed answered,
as far as she could. The conclusions are indeed my own responsibility.
From the
shock, I write my first spontaneous reaction in fluent German. Afterwards I do
not send it, it was too hard for her.
I shy off,
for the umpteenth time. Go to sleep.
10 September
1992
I put aside
everything today to be well prepared for the establishment of the Platform
Global Awareness. Two weeks ago, I submitted a proposal to give a 'flying
start' to this Platform. Aid to Yugoslavian
displaced persons in the Netherlands and an amount per capita to be
voted by the council, for the large joint fundraising (rural) to Somalia and
Bosnia.
I can cry
now. So I do it. After a little playful opening speech of the mayor, we
continued the meeting. And all official events were treated as the drafting of
an annual plan, joint events, bylaws etc. Nothing came out of the paint.
Participants
walked away. When barely half was over, my proposal was on the agenda. All I
wanted was my name swept underneath the platform and then to the City Council.
Well, you cannot expect in such a situation that the point is also discussed
but equally serious. The next meeting is late January. And then I have to come
up with a concrete proposal. As if this was not practical. And others thought
again that they first had to talk with their supporters about it, while the
Platform is designed precisely to take independent decisions. They have, it is
clear, no idea, what it's like to sit in the war.
118
Oh, next
month the need is still there?! Yes, and the fact that they are there left in
the shelters by us, let down this winter, means nothing. And that belongings
and money will only be available next year (maybe) is less important than a
rich regulatory conduct of meetings. I was so angry and bewildered that I'm
seriously thinking to do the whole action and only in a personal capacity. But
I just cannot physically and mentally. I have even taken on working for a
torchlight vigil on December 24 against xenophobia and smears against refugees.
So this was
the big disappointment today. The leaflet Globally, that this time must be
written exclusively on the Ad control, was again nice. I have written for that
a very small article and controlled and corrected it. On Saturday the
volunteers market and on Tuesday is the AFKIN- meeting.
I know I'm
doing it myself, but I would love to continue to do everything, writing,
mourning and work. Help!
That
participation in the ABZ- committee has been a great success! National
newspapers and the Utrecht’s newspaper wrote about it. Elma was not allowed
to, but did have contact with the
consultative body of Moluccan Welfare and Lilipali from the parliament. That
has raised questions for the minister. The VNG downplayed the case, as
uncertainty of Mayor Laan. I was able to bring him the parliamentary question
and wait for the answer from The Hague.
That's my
life.
But I long to
be again, completely busy with the past, with myself, so that I have written
this all. Hey ... it is with a feeling
that I, in this way have been able to tell about my mother.
The spirit
goes where it will- there for her no time, no distance. She moves in other
dimensions, other people, other times and conditions. Provided that it is
willing to be empathetic.
Here I sit, I
can do nothing else, and who wants to go with me?
119
It could have
happened like this.
It's August,
1942. It is a warm day, threatening to storm. Olga and Erica go to Olga’s
sister Hilda, who has a baby. That is not easy at the time, raising a baby.
Olga has a
star, a Star of David on her dress. She did not have a coat on; it's the height
of summer. If small Erica also wears a star? I do not know.
At the end of
the afternoon the sky darkens, but nevertheless it's not raining yet. Hilda
discovers that she needs something for the baby. Milk? Flour? Or the teat is
broken, or the bottle ....
And Olga
offers to quickly go and get it. Quickly , because it is nearly curfew. Then
there should be no more Jews walking about outside ... because the air is so
threatening she calls to Hilda: " I just put on your coat "and
leaves.
And then she comes upon a Dutch policeman or a
border guard, who sees a yellow star and from that liberty takes hold of this
young and attractive woman. To his pleasure and her terror the star was not
sewn, but pinned. That is for him the reason, that he, under threat with his
gun-there were stories that she had been shot dead on the street, but that was
not true - to arrest her and confine her in prison.
At home
waiting, in increasing panic, Hilda and the little Erica. And as it gets later
Hilda is more certain that Olga has been arrested. Because she did not have the
star sewn on her coat but had fastened it with safety pins.
It takes days
before they are assured. It lasts until September 8 before she receives a note
from Olga herself, who is currently on route from Amsterdam to camp Westerbrok.
Olga tries to encourage her sister even at that time. But on September 10 she
sends from Westerbrok a telegram in panic to Hilda, asking her to send the
"Aryan" papers from her ex-husband, it does not help. The next day,
September 11, she is stowed in the lorry, to Auschwitz, where she is
immediately killed upon arrival.
120
And then she
comes upon a Dutch policeman or a border guard, who sees a yellow star and from
that liberty takes hold of this young and attractive woman. To his pleasure and
her terror the star was not sewn, but pinned. That is for him the reason, that
he, under threat with his gun-there were stories that she had been shot dead on
the street, but that was not true - to arrest her and confine her in prison.
At home
waiting in a great panic, Hilda and the little Erica. And it is getting more
certain that Olga has been picked up. Because she had not sewn on her coat the
star, but had fastened it with safety pins.
It takes days
before they get affirmation. But it is not until September 8 before she
receives a note from Olga herself , who is under way at that time from Amsterdam
to Westerbork. Olga tries to reassure her sister even at that time with
courage. But on September 10 she sends from Westerbrok a panicked telegram to
Hilda, asking her to send the "Aryan" papers from her ex-husband. It
does not help. The next day, September 11, she is stowed in the lorry, to
Auschwitz, where she is immediately killed upon arrival.
120
For Hilda the
nightmare would now have begun. This is irrevocably the last time that Olga can
help her. In fact die for her.
What should
she now do with the little Erica? It is as hard as it is with the baby.
Fortunately, Erica also has a father, an 'Aryan' father still, who, to
complicate the story, at that moment ‘for appearances’ is married to Hilda.
Naturally he is divorced from Erica’s mother. His father, Jack, has a brother
who is recently married. And they want to look after Erica.
But if Olga
does not return- and nobody knows whether she will- it becomes even more
difficult. Erica then suddenly becomes a Jewish child, a risk. And then the
wanderings of the child starts from hiding - to hiding place, until no one
knows anymore and she is back at her aunt and uncle on the sidewalk.
Where is
Erica’s father at that time? It appears
that he is sent to work in Germany until he manages to escape in the summer of
1943. He is "married" with Hilda and according to the Registers and
Population of the town hall they live at the same address, but actually he
lives with his father, Erica’s grandfather.
When he,
after his escape, will look for his daughter and arrives at his sister in law ,
that's just at a moment when they are "beating" Erica (his words,
many years later). After a violent argument he takes his child to his home,
where she has a few wonderful months. The only good time actually in her
childhood, when she became an adult, could fondly look back.
That sister
in law has not let it sit. Jaap show no signs of gratitude that she has been
part of the child's fate, especially since she was still a Jewish child.
Instead, he has quarreled with her, added her reproach and 'just' captured the
child. Calling for revenge? She can, so she turns to someone from the Council
for Child Protection, "because it's inexcusable that such a small girl
grows up by two men, moreover, it is a Jewish child.’’
121
The latter must
have been difficult for the Council for Child Protection, but there is someone
who has signed a letter that the Germans include Erica van Beek at the Martha
Foundation in Alphen aan de Rijn. The
Martha Foundation appears to be ‘started’ in Alphen by the Germans! In
Nieuwersluis some of the children were housed.
On a cold,
wet, dark day in December 1943 is Erica then "safely drilled ' in the
Martha Foundation, where she will remain until she was nineteen.
And Hilda?
Hilda with
her two older children can safely get away from Vienna. She gets the chance to go to England. But she
prefers to let her children go - with a girlfriend - she continue to stay in
Amsterdam.
After the war
she married Louis, after a divorce from Erica’s father. The baby from the beginning
of this story thrives on and has a father and a mother. A second baby, born
during the war, does not survive. Hilda with her child also sat for a while in
Westrbork but knew how to survive.
After 1945
she performs a short struggle with the Jewish Refugee Committee and the OPK,
the War Foster Children Committee, to regain her older children. She may have
tried to get Erica out of the orphanage. That did not work. And failure is
–possibly - based on the fact that she is Erica’s aunt and her stepmother.
Well, the OPK did their own standards and Hilda would have not have coped with
the possibility of raising four children.
Has Hilda
been happy with her memories and her past?
122
Vienna
It must not
have been easy living in Vienna between 1920 and 1933. There was the recession,
unemployment, poverty. There, as well as here. Grandfather, Armin Bock, refugee
from the Czech Republic, had become stateless. Married to the Viennese Joszefa
Karpfen (omama, my grandmother), his two children, daughters Olga and Hilda,
are also stateless. Although Jewish, there is no indication that they were part
of the Jewish community in Vienna. But Grandpapa had, due to the persecution of
Jews fled to the Czech Republic. What did he do for a living? Had he (right)
support when unemployed? Or did the family in the beginning a little capital?
Grandpapa
apparently died young. The family was a
member of the Socialist Workers Party. Especially omama seems to have been
militant in it. The youngest daughter, my mother Olga, was also an enthusiastic
member of the Arbeiter Turn Verein and even later won gold at the Workers'
Olympiad in Budapest.
The single
parent family seems to have been very needy. Reasons why Olga took the decision
to try to find a job in the Netherlands. She came to the Netherlands and found,
except for work and income, a man and later had a child from that marriage.
The eldest
daughter had two children in Vienna. From a relationship with a man she could
not marry?
The story is
complicated.
Hitler's hell
is visible in 1933. In that year, in October, Olga married in Netherlands Jaap
van Beek, not a jew, but a blonde blue-eyed Dutchman. (A few generations back,
one Lady Von Dalmann of German landed gentry, married to a Van Beek, so the
"Aryan" could not be doubted.)
Almost two
years later, from the marriage of Olga and Jaap, a daughter is born, Erica. The
marriage seems to have lasted for a half a year longer. Olga goes back to
Vienna with her baby. It is not known whether Hilda is (still) financially
maintained, nor is it known whether, as the separation between Olga and Jaap is
final, Olga receives alimony. It can be assumed that Olga earns a living for
the family. At that time, Erica is so ill that she is hospitalized in the
children's hospital in Vienna and has a lot of children’s sicknesses
consecutively. Which cannot have been conducive to Olga to keep her job.
After
Kristallnacht not only hell breaks loose in Germany, but the panic among Jewish
citizens in surrounding countries.
Jaap since August
1938 separated from Olga, goes to Vienna and begs Olga remarry him for her and
Erica’s safety. Olga refuses and points out to him that Hilda and her two
children are much more vulnerable. How is Jaap committed to marry Hilda and her
two children for their safety while he still loves Olga? Olga is a strong
personality, an athlete at heart, much stronger than Jaap and Hilda together.
Olga goes
with Erica and Omama 'on vacation' and when they come back, Jaap, Hilda and the
two children have left Vienna. That must have happened in the summer of 1939.
Aunt Olly
Weiss
As said Olga
was a member of the Arbeiters Turn Verein. In the same building where she lived
with her family, also the Weiss family lived. And the family loved the little
children of Hilda, especially the eldest daughter Inge. Olly Weiss was Olga’s
team mate.
Olly sought
and found work as a housekeeper or maid in London. She also wanted her parents
to come and Hilda with her two children. She was lucky to find one Miss Palmer,
a wealthy lady who wanted to guarantee both the family Weiss and Hilda. This
event took place in the course of 1938. In '39 all was arranged.
But when push
came to shove, in other words, when Olly went to Vienna to pick them up, Hilda
now turned out to be married to Jaap. Rather than be a maid in England and take
care of her children, she went to Amsterdam with Jaap. While her children, with
a 'children's transport' travelled to London. After being there for ten months,
Inge went to live with the Weiss family,
where, after the death of Olly’s parents was raised by Olly herself. Her
brother Kurti was raised up by foster parents. Both children remained in
England, becoming adults and received British citizenship.
124
Hilda’s third
child, Ilse who was born in the
Netherlands, stayed with her. It was after the war, so she got a (step) father,
grew up prosperously , but not without trauma as the second generation child.
And was actually an only child.
The war also
seems to have been for her parents an indigestible matter and when the daughter
was mature they decided to separate. Not long after that Hilda died, she was
burned out.
13 December
1992
I am sitting
with my feelings back in the war times. For a few days now. Has nothing changed
in fifty years? The realization that the Platform, so Nieuwengein then , now
refuses to do something about the misery of the displaced-shelters in the form
of some distraction, or to advise B & W on a contribution per capita for
Bosnia ( where a hunger winter of '44
is on the way!) and Somalia .... Here
nothing can be done, knowing how it is makes me so desperate that I cannot
sleep and can think of nothing else all day. Although yesterday I have been at
the stand of Novib at the voluntary market all day with a friendly face.
You know, you
can only talk to people who know what you're talking about.
I am glad
that the action against xenophobia, against illegal smear campaign, comes in
order. Peter has created posters for the twenty-fourth. Women for Peace and
Amnesty participate.
125
So I can channel
my grief and my anger without damaging myself.
Sadness and
anger are not gone, oh no.
I want to go
back to December 9, the letters.
I will tell
Rabbi Schachter the story briefly, why I am so determined to straighten out the
Pages. Does he not see it himself, that it is not a remembrance of my mother,
but the desire of my niece to have the name of her family member in this?
N'importe
what kind of data? Not one syllable of it was correct, except the name. My
first feeling was therefore, that the Rabbi, felt a little passed over ,
because I did not respond to the discovery of the niece, who also knew nothing.
But that is not what I was looking for, I must make it clear. Reparation for
Olga, of whose life and death only Hilda knew about and who kept silent from
me. That mantle of fifty years that was revealed by Olly, with instructions
never to let Ilse and Inge know. I want that also in the Pages. I will have to
let Ilse know of that letter. How? I'll have to think, well that's no rush.
Other things
remind Olly that she no longer can place. But concerned about that time, she is
still, though she says that she does not have any "fight" more with
her 85 years.
That means
that she had in that in the past, and that shows. The courage not only for
herself but also for others to find a safe haven, speaks from her letters. It
is a pity, a great pity that Inge and Kurti that I should have known so well in
Vienna have disappeared completely from sight. Actually just like Ilse. A
family band will I never have with them again, but it's nice that I have heard
about them again.
Over the
acceptance of ‘that coat ‘I am still not there, even if I put it in
perspective. How do you do that as a victim? I can say, Hilda, I forgive you;
the fact itself is your underestimation of the danger of your carelessness.
That is something that happens.
126
But it did
have my mother killed, as you ought to have been wearing that coat. And as you
have survived (but how?), so she could
have survived. She would have taken Ilse , combative as she was. Now my
life has given Ilse a home, but apparently not a happy childhood. Let me hold
on to that. Ilse has also become a war victim, her "home." And my
life has consisted of flights from nowhere to nowhere, me closing my past until
now. Here only I have found my home. Only after three children and two
marriages. My oldest lost through drugs and suicide-no mother who could reach
him, he was imprisoned in himself.
Jacob, my
child that hid under a coat until he suffocated. From a fear of living.
Leo, who is
alone and that maybe will remain that way, grew up with me and two fathers
could not be real fathers.
Jessica, who
is still fighting for freedom under that coat, which she now knows, exists.
I myself,
that I no longer dare to venture into a new relationship, after making wrong
choices five times. Thanks for the one who taught me to sublimate my anger and
grief into action for people, who like me suffered from oppression and
infringements of his human dignity, proclaiming rights for the incapacitated!
Is that the
key to my whole life after Olga? Oppression and disregard for my human dignity?
Finally, I was Jewish and, as such, was I- treated in the time when I lived. I
see now. And I have acted in the past twelve years, but for recognition of my
person and to restore my dignity
From my
empathy with those, and for those that I I worked with, from what I have
experienced myself.
But also of
anger and sadness, which could not be captured in words, because I kept the
cargo from the past denied until now.
127
15 December
1992
What is -and
what is the function of -a prophet?
Pastor Mook called me, ‘The prophetess of
Nieuwegein. ‘ That has lingered.
Tonight
council meeting . In the break I was talking to J.H. He told me
enthusiastically about the worries of preparing for Christmas. And I told him
that I was not able to celebrate Christmas this year. What happens so close
east of our borders. With Bosnia and images of Somalia.
Another
councilor said later, "You did not come to make us sad, huh Erica?”
What should I
do? Stay talking in the form of politeness? I may not express my feelings, my
sorrow and anger and impotence in order not to disrupt the Christmas party? May
I not indicate that we cannot celebrate with a clear conscience and cheerful
mood while such terrible inhuman things happen this Christmas season?
Did Reverend
Mook mean that I am a thistle under foot? Or (calamity) prophet who disturbs
the peace of the conscience of Christians and non Christians?
We, war children and adults know, yet have still
all experienced at firsthand? And yet are still scared, angry, helpless and
almost powerless? Almost, because only a small area, we cannot get involved to
resist the immense indifference, the ‘cocoon’. Pull that screen, that wall
you've built around you and just see what happens around us. Let's work
together to try there to change that. It is not for us, then for our children
and grandchildren. So that the blood on our hands of our indifference does not
come upon our descendants. Then we will be certainly guilty. Omama, as weak as
you were, you were a militant woman who meant a lot for the labor movement.
Mutti, the
strength of your character, your perseverance and sportsmanship, your living
will to start a new life here, with all the menace of Hitler Germany. Give me
some of your perseverance, despite all resistance. I'm so discouraged now.
128.
Who wants to
hear
Those who
wish to see
Who suffers
too
Not just with
me
But with the
horror
Where people
like them
Should survive them
or die?
I did not ask
for, nor can I shut myself away from it.
My
powerlessness over my past blends seamlessly into despair about the horrors of
today.
I thought I
could get away now, but every time that it takes longer, I am more a part of
them. I hear them, right here in my safe little flat I'm not safe there.
L’histoire interieure se repete toujours; comme l'exterieur. Et parce que cette
histoire d'aujourd'hui est l'exterior. Et parce que cette histoire
d'aujourd'hui est l'histoire de moi-meme et de Maman et Omaman et six miliones
des autres hommes. Et il passe aujourd'hui, après cinquantes années.
Now back in
French, earlier to Olly in German. What comes up as I write this?
Say, write
what I know, what I feel. And make people participants of what happens ,
whether they like it or not.
The coat has
to go.
I fight and
wrestle with all these feelings, day and night. Sometimes it's sadness so great
that I have no spoken words, and if I find them, because of the interests of
others, my mouth takes over, without being able to stop it.
Is this the
function of a prophet?
Or do I behave like an intrusive campaigner?
No, that is
not me. But maybe they see me like that, if I do not keep my feelings under
control and thus contact others in their heart and conscience.
I do this
more than ten years-over declared unfit for work (sick and disabled), over
racism versus equality. If it would leave me indifferent, I would have no need
to write about it or talk about it. Sometimes they give me the feeling that
they think I am mad.
So be it.
This is me, Erica, made up of a life that was dominated by an invisible and
unknown coat of fifty years now. Exponent of "lest we forget."
129.
16 December
1992
I just read
Ilse’s letter of 14 November again, where she tries to untangle the knot that
has occured upon completion of Rivka’s addition to The Page. The history of Olga and Hilda were
jumbled. This could imply that Hilda has also told Rivka facts - the jacket-
and Rivka has therefore become confused,
that is the misunderstanding . I try now
to put it in the time. Everyone was still busy processing, or stopping of the
flaring memories of the horrors. We were traumatized, and could not put into
words what kept us so busy. Maybe Hilda has told her story confusingly, which
was picked up as such. But when she wrote a letter about it, not only Olly knew
it, but Rivka knew then - and Ilse also now!
1.How do I
tell Ilse?
2.How can I
tell that to Aunt Olly?
Oh time, get
me in that matter!
Kalien
Blonden called. Relief: the radio programme is off. The editors did not think
it a good opportunity.
I let on to
her surprise that I find it fine,because
the only reason I had agreed, lay in the search for survivors, who would have
known her. That is now no longer necessary. Thence.
130.
130.
The last data
is now coming in and the next week I hope, if not the real grieving process,
yet will I finish this book.
In the last
few days, there were quite a few things that ran together, so it was difficult
to stay with this case. So emotional, I could not sleep and really collapsed
yesterday. (And promptly at half past three in the afternoon I slept until
eight o'clock this morning, with some interruptions!)
Why my
emotions with me went on the run?
Among other
things because I cannot handle that people very carelessly spend millions and millions on Christmas shopping,
chunky tables, feasting, while just over our border and further, into former
Yugoslavia, history is being repeated. The same history, which I'm trying to
deal with in this book. Shut up, Erica, don’t make us sad, and do not appeal to
us and our consciences. Don’t you see that we want to celebrate, you disturber!
Judging by
the signals I expected Thursday, December 24th not a big turnout for the torch
vigil, we organized as AFKIN.
Yesterday I again
brought out in the library, the Jewish Weekly News. Searching for clues that
maybe I had previously overlooked. In the Jewish Weekly News, number 20 of
August 21, 1942, I found an article on the confirmation of the star.
131.
Serious warning
The presidents
of Amsterdam’s Jewish Council make further emphasis for Amsterdam's attention
to the obligation of Jews to:
1st to
properly attach the Star of David and wear it visibly;
2nd refrain
from entering gardens, parks and all the roads that are forbidden for Jews;
3rd not use
traffic ways without a license;
4th not live
or stay at other addresses than the above address mentioned on the identity
card.
Violation of
these provisions has led in several cases to severe punishment, even when it
was solely due to carelessness. Hence the repeated serious warning.
It is conceivable that Hilda has even tried to
get help from the Jewish Council, or at least tried to get to the Council for
information when Olga was not coming home. Maybe she told them that Olga was
wearing her coat. But nothing helped. This remains hypotheses, but I cannot
imagine differently.
21 December
1992
Today I
received this letter from the RIOD:
Dear Mrs van
Beek,
In response
to your letter of 2 December 1992, I can tell you the following:
The
collections of the RIOD contain unfortunately no more details about your mother
Olga Bock then you are already familiar with. For example, there are no
documents that have been preserved, which relate to the arrest of your mother.
132
THE JAILS
ADMINISTRATION HAS NOT BEEN RECOVERED
AFTER THE WAR*
Of the
documents relating to the Westerbork transit camp, the proof is that Olga Bock
was indeed deported on 11 September 1942.
I would have
liked to have done more for you. I'm sorry, that by the limitedness of the
material at my disposal, it is not possible.
Sincerely, Ms
A van Boxmeer.
Where can I
still go with my anger and sadness? Is there a policeman ever punished for the
preparation of murdering my innocent mother? A driver for obediently bringing
her to her place of execution?
And today
happens again the same! Are people because of their origin, their religion,
massively persecuted their appearance, killed, expelled, put to flight. And
survivors should only see them ready to come out.
Okay, okay,
it's all happened fifty years ago and I am only now so far, I can handle it a
little, to relive that time for myself.
Yet it is too
much for me, as before, the same things are happening. My empathy should not be
stretched too far!
All and
sundry of the Dutch tribe celebrates rather extensive Christmas. So I
don’t need to .
*Capitals are
mine
133
23 December
1992
It brought to
mind again the note of Olga. There is no trace of reproach to Hilda . Instead,
she tries yet to speak to Hilda with courage, "Kopf hoch, Madel."
History does
not change its view. Never has there been a ‘point of return’. Who am I, that I
look back with so much anger and resentment at a time, which cannot be compared
with this time, in this society, in this same country? And, I have the examples that today terrible things happen
with and through people.
May a man
fail? Weak and maybe a coward, if he should suffer such intolerable tension, as
at that time? With, still, the examples of Germany and now in Yugoslavia.
130.
The last data
is now coming in and the next week I hope, if not the real grieving process,
yet will I finish this book.
In the last
few days, there were quite a few things that ran together, so it was difficult
to stay with this case. So emotional, I could not sleep and really collapsed
yesterday. (And promptly at half past three in the afternoon I slept until
eight o'clock this morning, with some interruptions!)
Why my
emotions with me went on the run?
Among other
things because I cannot handle that people very carelessly spend millions and millions on Christmas shopping,
chunky tables, feasting, while just over our border and further, into former
Yugoslavia, history is being repeated. The same history, which I'm trying to
deal with in this book. Shut up, Erica, don’t make us sad, and do not appeal to
us and our consciences. Don’t you see that we want to celebrate, you disturber!
Judging by
the signals I expected Thursday, December 24th not a big turnout for the torch
vigil, we organized as AFKIN.
Yesterday I
again brought out in the library, the Jewish Weekly News. Searching for clues
that maybe I had previously overlooked. In the Jewish Weekly News, number 20 of
August 21, 1942, I found an article on the confirmation of the star.
131.
Serious warning
The
presidents of Amsterdam’s Jewish Council make further emphasis for Amsterdam's
attention to the obligation of Jews to:
1st to
properly attach the Star of David and wear it visibly;
2nd refrain
from entering gardens, parks and all the roads that are forbidden for Jews;
3rd not use
traffic ways without a license;
4th not live
or stay at other addresses than the above address mentioned on the identity
card.
Violation of
these provisions has led in several cases to severe punishment, even when it
was solely due to carelessness. Hence the repeated serious warning.
It is conceivable that Hilda has even tried to
get help from the Jewish Council, or at least tried to get to the Council for
information when Olga was not coming home. Maybe she told them that Olga was
wearing her coat. But nothing helped. This remains hypotheses, but I cannot
imagine differently.
21 December
1992
Today I
received this letter from the RIOD:
Dear Mrs van
Beek,
In response
to your letter of 2 December 1992, I can tell you the following:
The
collections of the RIOD contain unfortunately no more details about your mother
Olga Bock then you are already familiar with. For example, there are no
documents that have been preserved, which relate to the arrest of your mother.
132
THE JAILS
ADMINISTRATION HAS NOT BEEN RECOVERED
AFTER THE WAR*
Of the
documents relating to the Westerbork transit camp, the proof is that Olga Bock
was indeed deported on 11 September 1942.
I would have
liked to have done more for you. I'm sorry, that by the limitedness of the
material at my disposal, it is not possible.
Sincerely, Ms
A van Boxmeer.
Where can I
still go with my anger and sadness? Is there a policeman ever punished for the
preparation of murdering my innocent mother? A driver for obediently bringing
her to her place of execution?
And today
happens again the same! Are people because of their origin, their religion,
massively persecuted their appearance, killed, expelled, put to flight. And
survivors should only see them ready to come out.
Okay, okay,
it's all happened fifty years ago and I am only now so far, I can handle it a
little, to relive that time for myself.
Yet it is too
much for me, as before, the same things are happening. My empathy should not be
stretched too far!
All and
sundry of the Dutch tribe celebrates rather extensive Christmas. So I
don’t need to .
*Capitals are
mine
133
23 December
1992
It brought to
mind again the note of Olga. There is no trace of reproach to Hilda. Instead,
she tries to speak to Hilda with courage, "Kopf hoch, Madel."
History does
not change itself. Never has there been a point of return. “Who am I that I
look back with so much anger and resentment at a time, which cannot be compared
with this time, in this society, in this same country? And, I see through
examples today that terrible things happen with and through people.
May a man
fail? Weak and maybe a coward if he should suffer such intolerable tension, as
at that time? With, still, the examples of Yugoslavia and now in Germany?
Hilda,
Whatever have
been the consequences of the 'coat', who am I, that I would condemn. If I have
to forgive anything, I do hereby wholeheartedly!
It apparently
had .
And if
not, then we have to accept that life is as it is and I am that I am. Do not
look back at what might have been if ....
And I want to
see in advance what is possible. What good things I can still contribute. So
what happened and what is presently happening east of our borders, will perhaps
not go repeating itself...
Over that and
this way I will have to write back to Olly and Ilse.
And I will.
I have
searched for my mother and found her. Even though I did not know how I would
find her, I knew that I had never taken leave of her. I did that now. And I may
mourn a youth that I and hundreds of thousands, even millions of children that
were taken away by the madness of power forces, who use the power they have to
create people that are immersed in grief, because they differ in color and
origin from what they propose as normal.
134
This is the
letter I wrote to Rabbi Schachter:
22 December
1992
Dear Rabbi
Schachter,
It took me a
few days before I was able to write back.
I would first
like to thank you again for your concern of my wellbeing.
Enclosed you
will find the new Page of my mother with a picture of her and me as a child.
Thank you that you want to take care of her file.
I want to
tell you again, so that no misunderstanding exists, I had to research the past
of my mother and me. I had no evidence that she ever existed, except this
picture and some papers, when in a short time two things happened. The book of
Elma Verhey "To the Jewish Child” was released and the conference “The
Hiding Child “, became public. I not only survived almost without memories, but
also with fear and anger that I did not understand.
I had to make
this quest. Not only for me but also for my daughter Jessica, a
second-generation child, so she and her mother will understand themselves
better and also to give her a past.
I've told you
about my two sons, one of them died by suicide, by deliberately taking an
overdose of pills and drugs. That has to do with my past. And the second son
has his difficulties through that.
And there was
another, important reason and that was to give a grave with her own name to my
mother. So she was no longer an unknown and unnamed victim.
135
I never
sought nor wanted relatives. Anyone who has survived, that knew of my
existence, never let that be known. Not even shown of their existence. I say
this not with anger or self-pity. But there is no room for them. I have my own
life, my (former) family, my friends and my work. With the latter I mean, I
(still) want to believe in the 'Global Village' and our shared responsibility
there-for. So I see my daily volunteer work. Here I have found my family and
friends. Believe me, I have no bitterness.
I found my mother. And my own past.
At the same
time I have lost my fear of my memories. And thus so many remembrances have
come back. Not all, the most traumatic still remain hidden.
I have among
other things discovered that my mother was arrested and thrown in prison and
later via Wester Bork in Auschwitz is murdered, that the coat she was wearing
at the time, with the pinned-star, was the coat of her sister. She probably
borrowed it to get something quickly for her sister’s baby. .and did not
return. And sister survived and has not looked back at me.
That makes
this discovery very difficult to process. Do you understand?
The whole
story of my quest, now by friend Paul typed and edited. I will keep my promise
and send you a copy. That is if the book is finished. If it is published.
A miserable
side effect is that this quest is taking place at a time when all that misery
in Germany and the former Yugoslavia is now happening. Where the Serbs are
doing the same things against non-Serbs, especially against Muslims. It is very
frightening to believe that humanity will never change, no matter how big the
technical progress and the communication possibilities for humanity nowadays
have become. On the contrary, it seems that we just want to use it to destroy
ourselves and the world. There was a time, not so long ago; I had the idea that
humanity was becoming better and wiser.
Well, I'm
wiser ... and sadder.
136
Regarding my
Israel I had the hope that the war with the Palestinians would come to an end
with election of the Labour Party. But there is still no sign of peace. On the
contrary, the PLO and Hamas will work together and I'm terrified for such
cooperation.
Judaism and
Peace.... will it ever go together?
Last I read
in a newspaper a statement by a Serbian word carrier: "War makes sense as
long as there is a possibility to make a profit." Is that not cynical? Put
the word 'peace' in place of 'war' and we can have the most delicious world.
And then of course an all-out ban and
closing of all weapons factories because
they destroy our world and kill our children, our fathers and mothers.
But these are
simply philosophical thoughts of mine. I expect no one, to make this a reality.
I'm going to
leave you. Thanks for everything you've done for me. Receive my best wishes for
yourself. Forever,
Yours
sincerely,
Your Erica
van Beek.
37
24 December
1992
A while ago I
wrote: "In the past is the present, in the moment what is coming." A
cliché, but how true!
The hatred is
now grown by supra-nationalism and social discontent is the seed where fertile
soil is found in the victims of today and future generations. The raped women
of Bosnia bring forth children who are already hated for their birth.
The fruits
thereof may be new wars again, in about 25, 50 or 100 years.
Tribal strife,
religious wars, they are now and always will be. Because we are only human,
obstinate and unruly.
And all
surviving victims will be able to write books like this ...
Peace on
earth is a dream, we have to face the truth.
Maybe that is
the lesson I had to learn and if necessary why I had to write this book.
The
"Global Village," which I dream of is the dream of a relatively small
group of people. With little power. And our world will continue to run maybe a
little longer. But will they survive?
To believe in
it, I would have to rely on the fundamental goodness of people. The fundamental
sense of responsibility for each other as human beings. The I = you feeling.
And I must
begin with myself.
Sigh..... I'm
not there yet.
39
Jood
141
January 29,
1993
Finally I
have written draft letters to Olly and Ilse. Maybe I can finish them Sunday and
send them. The text I want in any case to record here.
Dear aunt
Olly,
It took me a
long time to learn to live with what is written in your last letter. The
thought that Olga had the coat on of Hilda was very hard to bear. It is even
reflected in the title of the book about my childhood, that will be called Two
women and a coat.
Now the time
is ripe, now I am able to live with it, as with everything that has happened.
The period
from 1939 to May 1945 was on the Continent a time of incomprehensible terrible
events. Where the people who survived were injured for the rest of their lives.
Hilda was also briefly in the
concentration camp Westerbork, together with Ilse who was a baby.
I am
convinced that Hilda has gone to the Jewish Council in Amsterdam when Olga did
not return. And she told them what has happened. I am so confident because I
read in the Jewish Weekly from a few weeks later an article warning people
extra not to pin the star, but to sew it on: "Several people that are
pinning have been severely punished.” What I would have to forgive Hilda of, I
have forgiven her.
142
As you said,
life has not exactly been kind to me, but Hilda had to live with her grief and
her anger, and get on with her life. What's maybe never really happened, to
which maybe she was not able to.
I tell you
(including myself) once again: life is as it is. I've learned to accept that.
It is
possible that Olga on that (rainy!) day in August '42 put on Hilda’s jacket
just to get something quickly for the baby, and she was arrested (and taken to
jail and later to Westerbork etc.) almost as soon as she came out on the streets. Her face was so
truly Jewish, that I doubt that, even if for her a hiding place was available,
that she might have survived.
Therefore, I
cannot understand how Ilse, Inge and Kurti could know nothing about it, even
after Hilda and Louis died. It was still not intentional Hilda; it was
carelessness, with incalculable consequences.
I have
decided to send a copy of your letter to Ilse. Maybe that's a consolation to
her. She is still with sadness and anger from the past. There were so many, too
many things that she could not understand. So much that she was unable to go to
the conference Hidden Children.
Can you
imagine what war does with small children? Even those events that you cannot
understand, that feeling of "I could have better not have been born,"
which remains always. That entire trauma, your whole life. Until you have learned
to find words for and to use those words for yourself. This is done usually not
before your fiftieth birthday. And then the past, has long since used or deformed your character. And your
life decides. The fears and anger have become a part of you. How do you deal
with that? That is for an outsider very difficult to understand.
Life has also
not been easy for you, I suppose. But you, your family and the children were
not hunted in England as wild animals such as Jewish people in the Netherlands.
You were pretty safe there.
Do you
understand, there is no more reproach. To anyone. It all happened. As it is
happening in Yugoslavia. We never expected that it could all happen again. But
it does!
143
Dear aunt
Olly,
I have now
also been able to give my mother a funeral. In Jerusalem, at Yad Vashem in the
Hall of Names. And my whole childhood became memories to me.
That was the
purpose of the quest and no less for my life that now has to continue, more
than ever. The whole has to be a book that is worth reading.
I send you my
love and greetings and thank you for your help.
Hoping again
to receive a letter from you,
Your Erica.
Dear Ilse,
It has taken
a long time before I could process what I came to know about the past. Like so
many Jewish people, I have processed it- with a friend in this case in a book,
which will hopefully be released.
It is much, very much, that has become clear.
Also regarding aunt Olly’s feelings towards your mother. Do you want me to tell
you everything or would you rather just read my last letter to Aunt Olly? You
can also wait for the book. The title is Two women and a jacket.
Only
now am I able to discuss with you anything you want to know. Your sadness and
anger have become clearer to me. As for me, I have now learned to accept life and
let go of the past now that I have found words to describe it. That is also
thanks to you.
We cannot
change the past.
144
I'm now
finished with it all. And I hope you find the courage to do so too. Maybe my
letter to Olly will help you with that. Otherwise I will let you know when the
book comes out.
Do not
hesitate to write me, call or visit, if you have questions to ask. I have now a
different perspective than 'then'.
I hear from
you?
Yours Erica
These letters
I now send as soon as possible.
145
February
146
147
28 February
1993
Letter
received from Aunt Olly, which made me very distressed. Of course she's right.
But Elma and Paul found it too: Now I turn and I should be able to let it
sink a while.
Here's the
letter.
Dear Erica,
This time, I
find it hard to answer your letter. But first, I wish you luck with your book.
I had no idea you were a writer. But you have abused my trust. When I told you
about that incident with Hilda’s jacket I prompted you not to tell Ilse.
Finally, it was her mother's fault that may have led to Olga’s death, even if
it was indirect. Now it is in your book and Ilse will read it and she could
tell Inge. You cannot tell me that it was necessary to make their memory of
their mother worse.
I can only
hope that Ilse will not be too much affected.
Maybe it can
be prevented that Inge will know. She has enough to worry about with her
husband's illness. In any case, I do not think Inge suffers from her memories
of that time, because she and I only know of the events through other people.
Our only concerns were the war cases, we Jewish people, even strangers, were
treated the same as the English themselves.
I only hope
that now you are able to put the past behind you.
Best wishes,
Aunt Olly
148
Of course her
trust is, in terms of the jacket, ashamed. But how do I make it clear that I
did not just think that was precisely the point where everything revolved
around? For fifty years, my mother is dead in silence out of shame about it. Is
it not time that it is written, spoken and processed? Out of concern for them,
the now adult children of Hilda, I may panic again, keep my mouth shut, I feel
guilty for events in which I have had some part. I became the victim, not her.
Apparently
she was so angry (or confused) that she could not place the name on the
envelope accurately.
149
March
151
12 March 1993
Visit to
Westerbork. Search for Barak 41.0.
At five past
eight Jessica and I met at station Batau-north in Nieuwegein. The train to
Amersfoort at 8:44 we reached easily and we got there at just after nine. A
terrible station. With that in Apeldoorn, I think, one of the worst of the
Netherlands. A type of aircraft thoroughfare that comes out in Amersfoort-Never
land. It took a while before we could orientate and we even had to ask the way
to the Amersfoort station, where we should wait for Dorine to ride together in
her car to Westerbork.
The weather
gods had the first day of spring and made that the trip became an almost
festive experience. Despite the gray tones that marked the destination.
Just before
Hooghalen we decided to eat coffee with a treat. But it was only to get a
sandwich on stale bread.
The parking
lot of the Remembrance Centre in Westerbork lay still in the early afternoon.
And when we got out the full gravity of our goal fell like a gray blanket over
us.
Inside, in
the open lobby with visitor reception, the almost sacred atmosphere was
shattered by a whining barking dog. Moments later, the sound of Christmas songs
....nota bene, belong to a video film further on.
The
exhibition is almost complete. Only my mother was, also here, not to be found
in any picture, in any film. She was here as well? All the daily and weekly
horrors. More than sixty thousand people, including Olga my mother lived here
for a longer or shorter time before they were transported for slaughter in
cattle trucks.
152
It's all
displayed there, with matching sounds. Only missing the smell of fear.
At the end of
the exhibition, I was surprised by the fragment of a poem by Leo Vroman:
Come this
evening with stories
How the war
is gone...
And they
repeat a thousand times
All the times
I will weep
That was too
much. Internally I was at that time a lost, screaming and frantic child
appearing as usual, I think. Very controlled. Jessica and Dorine were not done
yet. But I could no longer see clearly.
Later,
outside, the worst point of pressure of the boiler could be taken. Through an
emotional spot, tears: "That poem of Vroman that they should have left
out...." Nonsense, of course. It hung there not for me. But it was the straw
that broke the camel’s back.
Walking
through the forest of the Observatory we tried to reach the Memorial Field ,
the former camp. I was actually secretly glad that we were a bit lost. The
final over tired body did during that seemingly endless walk make my emotions
fly away. At one point I heard and saw again and I could hear birds enjoy a day
out in the first warm rays of the year.
We reached a
crossroads. Where was the Memorial Field? Left? Right?
We decided to
go left.Mistake. An endless road without any traffic. Until finally a boy
approached with a transport container behind his bike and revealed to us the
secret of this traffic-free road.
Dorine had
wanted to pick up the car in order to go to the
Memorial Field . But here, on the site of the Observatory , whereby this
road also belongs cars may not drive. Because it causes interference in the
reception of space signals. Later we would be on the field, and perceive for
ourselves the enormous steadily rotating satellite dishes.
153
There was nothing
to do but continue to walk back and by the Memorial Centre , step on the bus to
the field. A bit of a bad feeling for me, because I was at the first
confrontation with the bus chauffeur several hours before quite emotional about
the sign on the front of the bus 'Kamp
Westerbork' in large letters. Did that now may not be: former Kamp Westerbork?
Or Memorial Field Westerbork? He responded quite shocked, he had never thought
about it. The driver was a nice guy who even picked us up again.
And the sun
kept its profusion spreading above us.
The Memorial
Field is only recognizable as ‘Camp
Westerbrok’ through the eyes of the mind. That means that on this radiant day,
close your eyes and try to imagine that every slight rise in the ground was a
barracks or a house, the roads were muddy pools, the air was cold and menacing.
And where there now is a floor in the area, the locomotive was with cattle cars
behind it. Dark, wet, cold. Screaming, crying, fear of death. Animal apathy
too. Human survival instinct in all shapes, smells of fear, impoverishment and
damp peat.... But also superhuman courage and optimism against their better
judgment.
We searched for Barrack No. 41-0, where
my mother had stayed, but there was not
before every barrack a mushroom with a
number. We dwelt at length on the former apple instead. For every Jew an
asterisk for each Shinti or Roma (Gypsy is still a nickname) a fire. An English
boy picked up a loose star to take it as a souvenir. "You shouldnt do
that," I said and he obediently put the star back on a stone. For how
long?
Walking along the ancient monument of the bent
rails, along the paths and fences, along the partially intact kept ruins of
barracks, my courage sank in shoes. Would I find the place where- about -Olga
had been? Along the way I picked up a piece of debris on gray cement with
pebbles from the side of the road. Something from the bottom, the base of the
former barracks. It has been given a place with just such a piece of debris
from Auschwitz, at home in a ceramic pot.
Then, with
the exit in sight and already standing bus, Jessica screamed. ‘Forty-one!! '
Dorine and I reacted sluggishly, for we had not expected it. ‘Ma, Dorine,
please look: Barak 41.’
From a huge
sense of relief that there was yet again a proof of her existence, I looked at
Jessica and Dorine to the mushroom which indicated that this was a house in a
long line. Did it mean that she ended up with friends or acquaintances? The
panic, which she must have known during the three days she was here? Immediately
afterwards I realized that I'm here, as her daughter and standing with her
granddaughter and my good friend, after fifty years, to bring her a final
tribute. As at a funeral. This is where I spent my last salute. That is so
Erica That I had to grin in spite of myself. My dead loved ones live in my
heart that was never tied to one place. But the relief to have laid the last
piece of the puzzle in place, having finished the quest, was great. I kept
grinning. Jessica was delighted that it was she who found the place, Dorine was
happy for me.
The purpose
of the journey was found. And in the van to the center I told elated to the
astonishment of the other occupants, ‘I have found again the place of my
mother’
The return
trip to the West was quick. And the thread to the past snapped when we were
tired and hungry and could find no place to recuperate, to get something before
we had to take the long journey home. Dorine decided to drive to Amsterdam. She
put Jessica and myself out at staion Amersfoort. Her children were too long
waiting for her, it was getting late.
My daughter
and I decided to first eat in ’The Old Tram 'opposite the station.
155
The waiter
was a friendly young flatter . The food was not even reasonable. Then he asked
in clearing if it had tasted, I could not help saying that the meat had been
too long in the fat, because the steak did
not taste good.
The train was
ready. Only in Hilversum, we discovered that we had taken the wrong train.
157
September 2,
1994
To create a
book, that was actually not what it was about. When the need was there, Erica
wanted to force in herself a breakthrough. Writing was just a tool. Has it done
her good?
"I can
now talk about myself, not as before , then you had to bring everything
out," Erica said. And I think:
Yes
You are now
Different
yet
the same
Paul
Twee vrouwen
en een jas
Dedicated
to the
Jewish social work ,
Dorine de
Gruyter,
in memory of
Olga, my
mother
And with
thanks to Paul Groenendaal and to Elma Verhey,
without whom this book would not have come
about
Foreword
On the 1st
September 1992
Erica writes
hesitantly in a nice small, silk-bound booklet, "was very cozy ..."
and she ponders further on the title of the diary that she wants to track the
reporting of the quest which it has decided.
The reason is
threefold
An inner need
which has become increasingly stronger in recent years.
All the chaos of her childhood surfaced.
she sits at
her kitchen table looking out over the gallery railing over Nieuwegein. In this
house she lives satisfied. Now is time to dare.
And she
begins to write and muses. The title….
They could
not have suspected in the summer of 1994, at the same kitchen table but much
happier, with a sigh of relief and glad to work on her book with friends, the
manuscript would shut and satisfyingly say, "Right, now we can eat. I have
a beetroot salad. Jewish recipe. Do you
like it? "
They would
certainly not have suspected two years ago, that her book would be in the shop
windows in 1994.
Yet that is
so. In August 1994 she was eating beetroot salad with two editors. Twice
repeated she had to go through exhausting the entire confrontation with its own
past, word for word, to make a diary into
a book. Popular portions, clarify things that diarists always perceived
as historic.
I was one of
the editors and I can assure you that the whole process from September 1992
until now, two years later was a hellish emotional period for Erica.
Paul Groenendaal
Leiden, 1 september 1994
September
15.
I have made a
decision. I will ask Dorine to help me-finally- to go back to the past.
I have told
that to my friends Piet S. and Corrie van R. Corrie is an old girlfriend that I
know from the anti -racism work and Piet is chairman of the club where I am a
secretary. I have told them that if I continue to function that I will need
their help. That is why you are my friends? Through difficult times to help
each other?
With Corrie I
had a good talk, among other things, the power that comes from daring to
continue to be vulnerable. She is currently in a difficult period and suffering
physically and mentally.
I gave her
calcium and magnesium, herbs and vitamins. In her family I am “the herb lady”
not completely unjustly.
Piet gave me
as an answer a mountain of work that by tomorrow morning had to be done.
for the first
time I realized that my teeth bit together when I heard my own keys rattle
while I opened the door to the deadbolt. Memories of the Martha foundation.
Later that
evening. The memories become clearer.
The leader, Ilsa Love, had the compassionate
habit of using her keys, if she wanted to "admonish" children.
1943
-Nieuwersluis?
We stood in
line one behind the other, naked, with a towel and a washcloth. Forty children.
Two at a time we were washed in a cold bath. Now again I smell the scent of it.
And in the dorms, there were many bed
wetter’s. Beds which were, roughly forty centimeters apart.
16.
Woe betides you if you have not said or sang
well before bed your prayers. God's love also expressed itself as
"they" heard children still whispering : then they made you stand
before your bed, cold feet on the ground, and wait and see how long they let
you stand. Sometimes for hours. And you dared not to go to bed or to say
anything. I was always picked out. If I had not knitted well , I had to knit at
night sitting on the marble stairs. If she was back on time and not pleased,
you got there "seams" in. And sometimes she forgot me. I sat there
half naked, until she had to go to the toilet and just saw me sitting there.
Stopping
blows. Every time going up and down the line. I
could never do it good and flee enough. When it was my turn , it was
time for slaps, until I was half unconscious. What made her even angrier was
that I could not respond. From fear, or also pride?
Then you had
to eat on the penalty bench, the “biekenbank” and you were not allowed to play.
In was proud
of my father , who could get on with her. Who brought so many sweets that all
the children, also those that had visitors could eat sweets too. What was left
over was taken away by Miss Geert Knoet. She searched me to make sure that I
did not hide any. All the children called him Papa and loved him.
Emmie Veldkamp- as snow white so beautiful. Red
cheeks, pitch-black eyes and hair. She sat behind me in school and kept
pricking me in my back with a pin. Finally I had enough; I turned around slowly
and dropped solemnly my ink pot over her head empty.
That day was
I beaten so much with the walking stick of Mr. van de Berg that I had to be
taken to the hospital. The children bullied me so much, because I never said or
did anything back. After the ink pot scene was that over for good. They saw
that I "just" only responded when it suited me. Nevertheless Geert
Knoete still saw me as a good victim, was why?
17.
3 september
1992
The name of Margaret G. Van der H. was
Greetje. She studied with me the Bible sitting in Alphen aan den Rhijn and
comes from the Martha charity. She made contact with me and we made an
appointment. Today at Central station in Den Haag. Neutral territory. We arranged to meet at the
third desk in the hall, at three o'clock and because we did not know each other
she would recognize me by a bright pink umbrella that I was carrying.
My train
arrived at a quarter to three , right on time. And while I stepped off the
platform and walked to the hall, I looked around to see if I could recognize
her. She should be wearing a red jacket. I did not see her so I waited
And as time
passed, the passengers around me were together at the counter and rushed to
their trains and I saw homeless and drug addicts. I became despondent and more
despondent .What could have gone wrong?
After waiting an hour I took the train home.
Money thrown
away, that journey and now I am skint. I can’t travel until I have money again.
Preparations for the municipal platform Global Awareness, where I among others
with Piet work, has so far cost nearly 100 euros on shipments, letters and the
like. It is voluntary work, therefore I have to see if I will get it back, and
if so when.
So I have just called Margaret: It was my
fault that the appointment did not go according to plan. I had Thursday in my
diary and she as teacher could only get Wednesday free. Therefore she waited
for an hour on Wednesday for nothing. We have now an appointment for next
Sunday, 7 September.
Then she
comes to me, not on neutral territory!
She told me,
via telephone, things about the Martha foundation that I did not Know any more.
About farmer Kwakernaak for example whose farm next to the home, whose calves I
could take care of. Oh yes , I still remember
that .
ik doopte de kalfjes zelfs , en voor
de stier , die altijd in zijn hok zat en die vreselijk hard kon loeien, was ik
erg bang.
I baptized
even the calves, and the bull, which was always in his kennel and who could
howl terribly hard, I was very scared of. Margaret told of the shoe maker of the charity , over
the subsequent build-up of the group of children. And I told him about the
injustice that I, because I was allowed to study, was held responsible for the
behavior of the younger children in my group. We talked for a long time , but I
can not visualize her.
There are a
lot of people of my age searching their
past. Rien G. is one of them. I know him only from the telephone. He too
is searching and has stories that for an “normal” man come across as
unreal. Rien is grown up in a Christian family and no one could explain to him
over his (orthodox ) circumcision. He has lived in Alpha aan de Rijn and later
in Boskoop. He remembered groups of children that rode bicycles in the Martha
foundation. I remember the kilometers long marches that we did in lines of
three ,to and through villages around Alphen. Very recognizable as asylum
children ,but bicycling ? I don’t remember that . The only bicycle that I
remember , I got from my father and that was stolen within two weeks! the
leadership will have had fun with that.
Family Cote.
Father was vice president, mother was a woman that every child wanted. We were
children , without parents, without family ,without backgrounds. They were very loved by us girls
that were growing up .I studied with
Mieke their daughter and I still have a photo of her that she is in with other
friends from school.
4 September
1992
Memories. Nieuwersluis. White, Sunday sleeved aprons,
black worsted stockings, clogs. White metal crib and curtains with lots of lace. Was that toys or
did babies lie in them? A very large house ,a park around about with a large
grass field.
19.
Upstairs was
a hall: The toilets flooded over, stink
and filth everywhere. No memories of the layout of the house or the daily
affairs .
Later, after 1946, Alphen aan den
Rijn. The group
where I first sat , was right of the building. That was of the leader (of day of night) Geert Knoet. Later on I sat
above in the group M2… the electric cables hung loose out the wall. I got a
shock and was unconscious for a while.
on a bench in a small alcove in the hall I came around. In the hall of
M2 I learned other children songs and dances. I made a dance from “ zeg
kwezelken wildet gij dansen?” I still
remember that dance and in bed I told
the kids always (horror) stories , where
the others always huddled
together in bed. That could then apparently.
Was it there
that I first got my menstruation? I was eleven years old and no longer in the
group of Geert Knoet. I must have been in panick when I found blood in my bed
in the morning. Scared to get punishment- or that I had a fatal illness.
But the
leader ( I don’t know which one) told me that I was now a Big Girl and no
longer could I play with the boys. She gave me clean sheets and strange-looking
terry "canvases" with a hole on each side and a waist belt. That was
that, that was my sexual information sessions and that of the girls of my
generation.
The school
attic, which stood on the site. What I did there? I was there sometimes for
drawing lessons? There were antique busts and heads of plaster and marble and
it smelled and was very dusty.
Mr. Van Dijk
from the third class sat with his hand in my pants . If I reacted he told me to
“shut up” and pinched me hard.
20.
These are
memories that come up. I don’t remember any of the other leaders except the
sadistic women Geert Knoet and Ida de Liefde
( the corpse if compassion , “so as we called her) she got later an eye
sickness , literally fire red eyes and according to tradition would go blind.
We called that the punishment of God. There were also good leaders , such as
the one Margaret called : Leny Zwaal.
Margreet
found it unlikely that I was made
responsible for twelve young people from my group ....I was studying and was
the only one that had a small room for myself- a former kitchen- where I could
do my homework.
“But” said
the former leader ( who?) “then you should make sure that the youngsters stay
sweet” or words to that effect. That I do not remember names! The result was
that I could not do my homework in the afternoon or evenings. I taught myself
from the clock tower that I could see out my window , to sleep and wake up ,
sometimes at four in the morning to do my homework. I had to be a good example
.Even now is six hours sleep enough! I had to go to bed at the same time as
the others and was controlled if my
light was out.
That ”
privilege “lasted less than a year. Then I had to go back to the “dorm “ and my
room became a kitchen again. At least in my memory.
Slak van
Beek. That was me. That is what they called me. Slow, clumsy, always the last
in the line, whatever line. In the line by Geert Knoet , for every run in the
black stockings or knitting on Sunday gray hosiery. How often did I have to
take my work back and start again? And how often did I get beaten because I was
the last in the line?
21.
5 September
1992
Zij van Vlink
, a girl in my class, whose brother had a sort of animal magnetism for me. It
depended on her if I may walk with her brother over the school grounds. It cost
me my best books. Pure blackmail!
Rieke and
Liesje Olie and their brother , who suddenly after the war were called Olij.
The choir of Jo Toet , partner of Daniel Waayenberg, and the songs that we
sang:
The heavens
remains gloomy hung down
A dead
silence reigns supreme
Creation
grieves, she has no songs
And the organ
tone of the forest is stupid ....
That has
always stayed with me. And now comes a thought to me and a singing game over
spring from princess Irene that we learned:
We are the
hares out of the woooods
The small
hares out of the woooods
and eating a
hazelnut….
Today I read
the Nieuwe Israelitisch Weekblad (NIW)from 28 August that was sent to me from
the telephonist from the Jewish social work . The tears are in my eyes as I
read the column from G. Philip Mok: “Am Jisraeel Chai.”
I am a Jew in
heart and soul. I realize this especially , because, even though
my past was by the Martha charity
very Christian and baffling , is very
agitated by the reading of the NIW and this column.
Will anybody
ever bring my soul to her right place?
22.
Margreet was
here. With a photo album full of photos of children from the buildings of the
Martha foundation. Truly also a picture of Geert Knoet! Margreet stayed till
five o’clock. I only recognized her when I saw her childhood photos. She is now
a grown up lady and a teacher. And I have been stated as being incapable to
work.
Although I am
particularly strained, there are still no emotions that come up with the
looking, talking about and recognizing of pictures from this time. Strange ,
actually. Names , names of people and places it was not more than that. Or not
yet? Just scents come back. And the tinkle of the many chains of Miss Corvase
the German teacher
And the face
of the pathetic spinster of needlework,-who
was also bullied by me.
We talked
about the family Cote, also for Margreet a very loved family. It was a shame that Mieke had so little
attention , because her parents were caring for more than four hundred
and fifty children. And hospitality and love, that the children received from
no one else.
23.
Still 7
September , evening
I have
asked Paul, my dear friend from the past
and still, whether he wants to read my
writings. And if it may ever be a book ,
would he be my editor?
In the years
past I've never been able to tell him anything from my childhood. And
when I tried it sounded confusing and
incomprehensible to him . And still I
panicked , as he practically forced me to go into the past, how lovingly
and patiently he tried. It caused unbearable tension between us.
My strange
reactions to his innocent remarks, my off-track anxiety and panic attacks , and
I crawled into my shell when he became irritated. His bohemian - like attitude
toward my need for security. Love and security, very civil, are synonymous with safety for me. For him it means trouble, curtailing his
freedom. Doubly, as a clipped bird in a
cage. That can not continue to go well. And therefore did not go well.
After two
years of silence I made contact with him. This is also the way to tell him
about my youth, all those things, all those fears that surface. Will I persevere to the end? And will Dorine
, my friend from the Jewish social work , and Paul , my old friend , able to
provide enough support for it?
Paul also has
his stories. Stories from his childhood, how he experienced the
war. And the years after. His life is a continuous line, with peaks of course,
like an ECG., But his Memories are a common thread running through his life.
And me? I have the feeling that my life only halfway in my adulthood begins.
The way back from there is not even visible, but it must be there. I'm finally
not come into the world as an adult, or without background or parents.
24.
The memories
keep coming. There is now no stopping them. When I was fourteen , in 1949, I
could stay whenever I wanted to at my uncle Bart and aunt Marie and their two
daughters ( Marie is the one that arranged for me to be taken from my father
and placed in the Martha foundation , But I had not realized that yet). After
staying there a few times they told me , that I May leave the Martha foundation
and come and live with them, if I promised never more to have contact with my
father! I did not realize that she therefore would experience the ultimate
triumph, by taking my father’s only child away- for good - after years
before, my father had me taken away from her. He told me once how he
accidentally had witnessed how they mistreated me and how he then took me, but
that's another story. Aunt Marie thought she’d
have cheap household help from
me? Until that point I knew no more about housekeeping than drying up .
After a short period of reflection I refused to give up my father. I had to
return to the Martha charity and I never stayed there again! They cried with
anger and disappointment but I never regretted my decision. Even though I was
thus in the Martha Foundation, and even though I was not yet aware of the
purpose and background.
Yet I was
then, just as unconsciously, an arrogant weight. I must have been nineteen
years and I just started working in the council office in the town of Woerden.
I had left the Martha foundation and was free to visit my father. With him in
Amsterdam, also lived uncle Coen (his brother) and his wife Aunt Cor. Uncle
Coen was a park worker and I worked in an office. I suggested that he was a
staff member and I officer. Absurd and ridiculous. We had words, it was not fun
anymore. Maybe I wantedto offend them by punishing them for leaving me in the
Martha foundation. In my childhood I stayed
with my father and with them?
Then they had to stay together in a house and were busy trying to get my father
, who was alone out, because they had a family. Grandpa was already dead….
25.
Grandpa !
That small house that I can still smell. Grandpa , whom I passionately loved,
who sat me on his lap , read and played with me, who cut all the cartoons out
of the newspaper and pasted them in a big book for me and upstairs there was
more big books and cartoons and other things were I was allowed to play . I
realized that in later years my grandpa and my father , played a smaller role
in my life , among other reasons , because, they both did more for the
youngsters of number 88( grandpa lived at number 90 on the Plaatijzerweg) and
for their mother, auntie Ella. I felt that I did could not come between or be
involved there .But the short time that I lived with my father and grandfather
and came to auntie Ella’s and played with the youngsters , Henk and Erich ( it
was not longer than a half a year), was the only rally happy time of my youth.
Back to the
Martha Foundation.
It's the
feeling. No conscious memory. It must have been dark, cold and wet. Rain and
wind, when I arrived in Nieuwersluis.
I have the
same feeling when I think of how I was brought
from one hiding place to another
to a person's hand, with maybe a briefcase or a bag in the other hand.
Actually I
can’t remember real memories out of that period. It is like a thin black veil
which is located over the entire past. You see it and know that there is something behind, but to see
through it is so difficult. There is nothing, even for only a moment,
illuminated, allowing you to see everything clearly.
I was there,
at Serreschans, in Nieuwersluis. It stank and was noisy and humid. In the
evening we folded our clothes on our shoes ,
some wore wooden shoes - so that we could flee if necessary.
26.
I had nightmares, others banged evening and
night with their heads rhythmically against the headboard of their bed. I know
of at least one time I'm sleepwalking into the dining room to sit and sat there all night, with my arms folded. Until the group came for
breakfast and woke me up. That is how it was told to me later on. Geert Knoet had to – with cold water- wash and
dress me completely.I seem to have come far away.
During every
air raid, all attacks on or near the railway line Amsterdam - Utrecht, we dove
at night under the beds. Or during the day, under the tables or in the ditch.
And when we gathered wood in the forest across the street, we looked panicked
for a tree to stand against.Their was a farm in the forest. If we were there in
the area we pushed in and stood against the wall. One child from the group once
stole something there. For that , later on all of us got one at a time , a beating. Geet Knoet knew how to give a
beating. And I never had the impression that she did so reluctantly.
Two
dormitories. Hepatitis broke out, jaundice, diarrhea and vomiting. Then we got
punishment. If you had to throw up everything was shoveled back on the board,
different food put over it and you had to eat it .
For days you
were given the same plate of food . That really happened.
On Friday
afternoon we went for a bath. Very soapy water, probably there was no real soap
anymore .All forty children went into the same bath water at least that is how
I remember it. I definitely remember on a Friday after the bath , leading
everybody to their knees beside the bed
. There we were in our our nightdresses or pyjamas , and I spoke facing where I believed East to
be out a prayer. Where did I get that from! Even Geert Knoet later on knelt and prayed with me.
27.
In that time
, I had also knowledge of everything that was eatable, and there was a lot edible
in the big garden around the grounds of Sterrenschans. I seemed to know
what wild rye and wheat were, which fruit was edible, which mushrooms were
poisonous. There was a bush with bright red fruits that we definitely had to
stay away from .But somehow or another I knew that the fruits were definitely
not poisonous. And they were really tasty. Since I had eaten it, they had ,
probably with fear and trembling, waited a day and then the bushes were looted.
What was left over was made into jam. The strange thing is that I lost some of
that knowledge after the war and was only returned in my high school years. How
could I, a city kid from Amsterdam and Wenen , know all those things and use it
too?
Cold ,
wetness, stink and fear. The feelings prevail over the war violence.
Why, dammit,
do I not remember how and by we I was
taken away from my father? Or how I was taken away from my mother ? I feel
darkness. Screaming and shouting from every side?
The panic of
then is again totally back. Bugger up all! Leave me alone.
12 September
1992
The past
won’t leave me alone. Now I have started voluntary work in abundance. I speak to a lot of people who want to talk
about the flash that one has seen in me in early news. That was at the
conference ”The hiding child” . That lasted three days , but the first day I
could not handle it, and I left in the afternoon.
Now their
stories are coming out. …. The stories from people that can’t forget how their
friends, and their classmates disappeared. How the rumors about treason and
hiding of teachers and teachers who disappeared and aunts and uncles and so on. Me they had never associated
therewith.
28.
18 September
1992
It's hard to
get hold of this book.I don’t feel physically fit and the doctor won’t allow me
to give blood for the red cross before he has his self-done an examination.
Still I want
to go back. Not to the time of hiding, but to the time before that. What do I
really remember from the time with my mother? Blank memories come up, real
memories!
We lived in
the Vrolikstraat in Amsterdam. I am in the living room playing with my dolls
house with real lights. My father made that. The curtains are closed, the
lights are burning.
In the back
room there is singing with guitar and mandolin en…violin? Austrian (mountain)
songs, Dutch hiking songs, operetta songs. I feel good about it, even though
I'm alone, but with Kareltje- Karlchen will have mentioned him- my big wooden
doll out of Wenen, whose legs moved back and forward when you moved his legs.
When we went for walks he walked beside me, then Mutti or someone else held his
other hand and we waved them back and forth.
Jetje my
neighbor .We play in the garden .Jetjes mother is with my mother. We ran on the
veranda , into the kitchen. But Jetje stepped in the wooden veranda onto a big
nail. I feel sick, because she had so much pain . Typical, such a reaction.
We play at
Jetjes in her house. She has a grandpa, who lives in the back room. One day
grandpa does something “dirty” . He takes his willy out and hold it against me
and Jetje. We were not allowed to talk about it. We found it so interesting,
that straight away we tell it to Jetjes mother…..The next day grandpa is gone
and Mutti wont talk about it.
Auntie Hilda,
Mutti and me walk in the Leidsestraat. Mutti has a yellow dress on with small
blue roses. I am playing hopscotch , pavement on , pavement off and sprain my
ankle. That hurts so much that I nearly faint. Mutti takes me in her arms .
Then I pee on her beautiful new dress and from shock I begin to cry really
hard.
I have warts
under my foot and was with her at the doctor. He burns them away and I
scream out. When that is done , is Mutti
talking with the doctor and I walk around and stand on something that is glass
that cuts my foot open. Mutti was upset and apologized extensively with the
doctor, but does not look at my foot.
With a lot of
kids at the same time we are at a clinic. In the entrance of the door stands a
doctor,who will cut out our tonsils. He gives a speech, where the mothers are.
He promises the kids (I think he overlooks me) a scooter with square wheels, if
they are very sweet.I am furious. I also want a scooter with square wheels, but
he has not promised me anything and I don’t want to go with them in. Without
mother , all doctors and nurses and strange big stools….And PAIN! With force
they opened my mouth, there is pain and blood in my throat. Panic!
Later on I got a present from Mutti, but not a
scooter with square wheels.
The front
room is the children’s room. The curtains, the cushions on the home made
plywood stools, the tablecloth, the curtain for the home made cupboard- everything
is covered in thin light blue material with small yellow and pink flowers. I
have a lot of toys, more than other children. My father makes a lot . I think
that he also made the furniture and the lamp.
But I am
rather at my auntie Jo, who lives behind us and has eight children. There it is
always busy and cozyThat is where I would rather eat, not at home, sometimes
Mutti eats there too.
Looking back,
it seems like I come from far away. Another time, different atmosphere. The noise outside
overwhelms me here. Then the reassuring noise
of the refrigerator takes over.
Back. Other
memories.
Across the
street is a sweet shop. Sometimes I get a whole penny to buy sweets.Then I go
with Jetje or with a girlfriend to look for what I want.
We always go
with a group of children, with a grown up , to the Frobel school. Then we pass
by a wasserete . Mutti is so beautiful, I am so proud when she comes with us.
Or if we go somewhere else. We go out a lot, also on visits.
Memories of
scenery, stage curtains, hollow-sounding voices and ballet practice rooms with
piano music.I am in a ballet group with other little ones But Mutti is
also very musical: she can sing and
dance and loves the theatre…
( Years later
I went with my father on a visit to a family Schubert. They came out Wenen and
knew my mother. And me as a small girl. Their home was a revelation, so
well-known and familiar to me. But the people, Mr. and Mrs. Schubert, I did not
remember.)
Mutti is
proud to make me beautiful. I remember a pink and white woolen skirt with very
nice buttons. A tartan dress of silk with a white lace apron, white silk socks
and black patent leather shoes.I feel the material now as I think about it…..
Images… They
keep coming, tumbling over each other in their haste to reveal their self to
me. I write key words in order not to forget them, not one can escape now, how
they whirl together.
31.
Argument
between my parents. The swing hangs from the doors to the veranda in the back.
They sit together around the table, maybe playing a game- and so I try
to swing that I can catch my father out. That poor sweet man.
Another
vision. I am in a holiday camp in Petten on the sea. Specially set up for the
sickly. I get there a sickness, perhaps nostalgia. It must be winter, a hard
winter. My beautiful Mutti is brought in with bloody legs and lies beside me in
the hospital ward. She has walked
far through deep snow and the hard top
layer has broken her silk stockings and rubbed her legs broken
.But she is with me again. She has to stay in bed longer than me. I don’t
remember any more, apart from that I don’t want to lose sight of her again.
Except when I go to the Frobel school. I made so many nice things and have
brought them home for her: a doily for the tea chest (with the coffee set) made by folding a countless number of times silk paper; and beautiful
things made of wire and colored
beads, such as a swing with side posts and a doll ( with a picture) on it. The
picture I made again in the Martha Foundation , I now remember.
From the
Frobel school , I remember a party. I have to run with a young boy to win a
glass of lemonade .There is two glasses: In one of them is real orangeade, the
other is colored on the inside. I win! And I pick the good glass too. He is
very mad.
A warm spring
morning. The sun has just risen. I stand with Mutti by the Bata. My father
works there. Airplanes fly overhead. Noise , bomb craters .My mother falls to
her knees , throws her hands before her face and begins to scream and cry.
War “Oh no, My God no!” Everywhere
people, everywhere panic. My father? I don’t know. My sweet , beautiful Mutti
is bleeding and crying. In my memory I am completely rigid and only see the
image and hear noise. horrible noise.
32.
Swimming in
th e sports fund bathson the Heiligeweg. I heard later that as a baby I could
swim. But there is panic, as I a toddler climb to the top of the diving board
and was suddenly discovered on the edge
of the shelf.UI was caught by a man. Mutti cried from shock.
We sleep in
the alcove ,the room in between . Beside
the back (living) room frosted glass sliding doors, which could make the
living room bigger ; beside the front
room with a wooden door .On both sides
was a bed.
Mutti often
wears a brooch from the Stefan Church in Vienna, where we must have lived. I
see the colors now before me. I find that the most beautiful thing and I climb
up on her lap often , just to see it.
Vienna. From
Vienna I remember little or nothing. A large, gray, barrack- like building
where all voices sound very hard. A big garden like a park. Or is it a park?
There I also have an Omama, that in my
memory is very big and stately, Many and very big stairs and very high. You
still see that in old films.
As I dive
into the past again without clear memories, at least without images.The feeling
of very fine porcelain The scents, the
scent of earl grey tea ,bergamot, roses, the under scent of certain perfumes, from
freesia’s: That was the scents of Mutti.
I must have
been a smart child. Bilingual, with a large vocabulary in both Dutch as East
German. And with only a faint notion of the dramas that took place around me
and the tension of the impending war. Then it was just very lucky.
33.
And suddenly
it was over.
One of the
last things I remember from the Vrolikstraat, the bomb crater is nearby, at the
corner of Van Woustraat.
19 September
1992
After all
these years, is now (of course completely unjustified, I realize that though)
great anger towards my niece Ilse, her half brother Kurt and half sister
Inge (my cousins ), not even a little
time to share with me .After Vienna- and from there I only have a photograph- I
never saw them again. Anyway Ilse has regular contact with Inge .Or is Hilda, her
mother and my aunt ( Muttis sister) responsible for that? Ilse has stayed in
England at Inge’s and sometimes Inge comes to Amsterdam. Ilse has worked on a
kibbutz. Ilse has kept her mother. Ilse is not to balame , no one is to blame.
These things just happen like that. But she has kept a whole family. I lost
everyone.
34.
Would
her mother not be responsible for the only child of her
sister? She survived, my mother was
killed. Maybe I was not really happy at hers , but I had family. Family in Amsterdam, in ,England, Austria( Vienna) and
Israel . Ilse kept those contacts. I never had them.
Bitterness is
not necessary and not good .But I still have to get rid of it.
Tonight I
read on teletext about the first really
anti-Semitic demonstration in Eastern Europe. And the decision by the Arab
countries to engage in a "holy war" against Serbia (for the Muslims
in Bosnia).
Fear strikes,
Nostradamus was right? Literally, also was the misery in Iraq predicted by him.
In 1994, Europe would be at war with Islam, and warnings would not help.
Wait and watch as Europe and Israel will
perish and America will get involved too late? So then we get World War III.
20 September
1992
Teletext ,
Page 312. Budapest. Tens of thousands of demonstrators against the president
and against the management of the Hungarian television. The Democratic Front
had warned against Jewish power.
Teletext,
page 313.If this "holy war" would continue - there is Iran an army
ready, says teletext- and if only if Saudi Arabia is against, what's going to
happen here? All those tens of thousands of young, rudderless Muslims who are
aware to be Muslims if they want nothing "to do", they will find a
purpose in this so-called holy war? A purpose to live for, an ideal? Ah heaven, then Europe will indeed be
overwhelmed by Islam, but other than
Nostradamus meant . Who predicted that the threat would come from Iran.
35.
There is an
enormous depression coming. I have to see . But what is the usefulness of the past, if there is nothing good to expect from the
future? I wrote that in a poem in 1956, when there was an uprising in Hungary.
Perhaps there is no future to live in
So we almost stand still naturally.
It seems to me, it is
far better to stay
Than to perish in the future.
I'm just here to do something else. Read Paul's
letters. He has everything I write on
the computers , and sends me the prints with a letter. Memories and things that
happen to him now, that never were related to me. About how he and his friends,
shortly after the war, were driven by nerves and panic to cause a massive blow to the garden of the Jewish family of Juultje .How much he regretted it later. How easily
he rolled over the war, his memories are
colored by his awakened wanderers
spirit.
In the newspaper Het Parool from 27 August ( why have
I not read that before now?) writes Chawwa Wijnberg: “The feeling of sadness,
anger and despair, which we (the children) as it were victimized ...)
She forgot to mention the fear and fundamental
loneliness.
I dreamed of a shindig in someone’s room. There was a
beaten up bed.Nobody danced with me, I desperately did my best to look as happy
as the others that were available.I suggested to them that we sit on the bed ,
but they did not want to do that. On leaving, someone showed me out and I just walked outside in the darkness.
Left the others behind me, and they went the other way.
36.
And I woke up
afraid.
And last night I dreamed of earthquakes and noise and
trapped between the people and I could
not go anywhere. I realized in the dream that that was the safest place
to be.
I have written to Ilse , and told her what I can
remember, or thought I could. I have asked her if she can tell me more. Maybe
her mother Hilda has told her things about my mother, my grandparents , about
Vienna. Maybe that will help me to remember things again.
21 September 1992
I want to try to continue. I have yet to discover a wide no man's land between
Mutti and the Martha foundation. I
find it very scary and it's all very murky. If I cannot find it, I must use violence. It wears me out, but also makes me stubborn.
At the beginning of this week I close this book and
send it to Dorine to read. Then after we have spoken about it , I take it back.
24 September 1992
Dorine agreed to once again pick up the image of my
mother. Like that , that is potentially imposed by my father and my family.
And try to find an answer to the question to what
extent it has affected my self-imposed image. And so my life.
Where I'm going and where I come from?
37.
Despite sleeping pills I have not slept in two nights. I'm too busy with voluntary work and
obligations thereabouts, then again, I also feel the desire to let that go and
come to myself. Does not work. Tired,
muscle and bone pain. I get up again at
05:15 and have put on coffee. Pondered
about errors and heartlessness present in others, about shortcomings in my
work. I talk too much. I've never been this way.
39.
October
41.
1 October 1992
I have fallen
into a massive depression and have layed everything (temporarily) down.
And I again feel guilty about that .... I was yesterday during a meeting
sitting at home so nervous that it was not fun anymore. It is necessary to prepare an event for
17 and 18 October, but I stuttered, could not get my words out, belittled
myself and understood little. I
feel spiritually paralyzed me and have pain all over my body. Why? What is
happening to me?
Jessica, my daughter has read the memories to Mutti.
She was happy , she said .It has given
her more information over her unknown grandma and more understanding for me.
4 October 1992
I could not do
anything the last few days. There was actually
so much work to do that I was
torn to continue, between my
desire with this book and my "love and devotion to duty" for the work
that must end 17 December, when the
municipal Platform Global Awareness is installed. All preparations for this swallowed my
time, my energy and my money. I had already given up the trade union work in
the past month, as well as my contacts
with council and commission.
Jessica had warned me that my dive in the past would
take my energy. She seems to have been right. It is still scary and it is still
not known if it is really worth it all:
I, the Jewish middle aged daughter, grew up in a
"Christian" environment, have come during this quest at a point where
I am searching for my Jewish roots. But precisely because of my past I hear,
and I feel, no longer at home in the Jewish community. What the latter may be.
42.
Anyway, here we go: the image I have of my mother. A
real image I have not so clear. A small, muscular woman, slim. And quite striking, very large eyes,
well dressed, sometimes chic. Sometimes happy, sometimes aloof. I don’t remember hug parties, nor things we did together. However, we were inseparable, which is
pretty normal for a single mother with a child.
Yet there must be, outside of the described memory, an
image that appeals to reality. Though
the knowledge from the past (not the
Memories), the fleeing and the fears of
the rising anti-Semitism before the war, persecutions, bring back real memories that I'm mentally
maimed by them. The image stays the same: My beautiful , sweet Mutti.
My father has told me about the fleeing to and from Vienna . He told me
about Hilda , whom we went together to
visit. And
he also told me that, years after the divorce, when he was long
just friends with
"mother" that he still loved
Olga . Her eyes, he could not forget them. At the same time, he really gave me
the picture with a woman, who was immensely irritated by his lack of willpower,
Only in 1963 I was, here, facing my past. I received from the Red Cross proof
of her death.perseverance and ambition. She herself had, after all, despite social opposition,
won gold medals at the Workers' Olympics in Budapest. That were immediately snatched away at
the border control in Germany, was another matter. He, my father had on his
marriage abandoned his studies in state economy to support his family. He could
not find any work in the crisis. For the support he worked in the DUW (social service’s)., but I don’t know if his
marriage was already over or not. That was the picture my father gave.
43.
Although he was a sweet, gentle man, he did not make
it with Olga, who must indeed have possessed so much more perseverance and
rationality. This is clear from what she has achieved in athletics, her
survival instinct, but also from the circles in which she must have been. Artists, theatre, musicians and the likes
of did not fit at all with the soft,
pliant and pure leftist worker boy who was my father.
I actually believe that from Olgas side, that it was a
marriage of rational considerations. However, he was lost from the moment he
saw her. That
he called her “hard” afterwards, I can understand now but it does not change
the image I have of her. That has something of defenselessness.
So far as I remember , we never talked about her in
our family. She is hushed and I was “the
poor small child” . Literally hushed .When I was at my first hiding place , at
the aunt from my father’s side, I must have asked when Mutti was coming back.” Do not complain, we'll see when she
comes back. be quiet, now it should be
over. "
No proof of her existence ever after.
A little understandable when one remembers how it was
at the time. At each address it must
look as if I belonged. And a child who complains about when Mutti was returning, was a danger
for her surroundings. The questions and even the memory was so very
quickly suppressed and eliminated by the mental and physical coercion from
outside. And
the multitude of impressions, all relocations and new environments and the
induced fears, the memories indeed disappeared. Nobody, apart from my father ,
had ever talked with me about my mother. Also after the war. It was- suddenly-
aborted. Only in 1963 was I, suddenly, confronted with my past. I
received from the Red Cross proof of her death. .A “Wiedergutmachungsgeld” from
Germany, which I can use to benefit my family. Only in that time, when I had received that relatively
small amount, I was wondering if there is somewhere maybe someone still alive
who my mother was. Despite
the obituary. Because I had two small children and a million
questions. I looked at every Jewish looking woman – Maybe she was the one? I
wrote to Israel, when I saw on television a woman that I thought looked like
Olga.
44.
As I got older, my feelings denied this
understanding of this.
There is bullying children's game in which the
children stand in a circle with a child in the middle. That one child with a hard push is
hurled to another. After such a shove you try to regain equilibrium, but before
you succeed in it, you get pushed again by another child. When you
think you are standing well
, you
are pushed before you can regain balance. That is the image I
have from my childhood. Once
I was with someone, I could hold someone. That brings a new memory in the
light. Me holding Mutti’s hand, always.
In the tram on her lap, me
doing most of the talking. I belonged
with her, I held on to her. The image I have of myself from earlier years,
after the disappearance of Mutti , is of
that child in the center of the circle.
Here in this falt in Nieuwengein, where I live from
1981, there has been change.
Divorced from my second husband, the children grown
up,I left
my soul in ” prayer” in charity work.
That is also a way of hiding from myself.
But I am
myself, Erica van Beek. A
woman for whom I could respect, despite her bouts of depression, crazy
reactions, and panic states.
There Paul and Dorine have played a big part in.
45.
9 October 1992
Yesterday I started with Dorine the
processing, and we agreed
that they would inquire about my mother
at the State Archives. The next time we will discuss when we will look for Olga
in barracks 41/0.
A picture of me as a toddler with a hat
on, has on the back the year 1939 .I was then four years old and back in
Amsterdam. A
fact that raises no recollection .
46.
Erica in 1939
47.
From Olgas letter from Westerbork to Aunt Hilda, I
took it that they had to report to the prison at the Amstelveensweg, because
she had not sewn but had pinned her star. From there, they should be sent directly to Westerbork
and Auschwitz. When
Olgas sister, my aunt Hilda died, I received from her daughter Ilse, out of her
legacy, a letter and a telegram written from Westerbrok. It was thus that I
finally collapsed and could do nothing
with the feelings that arose.
The telegram from Olga from Westerbrok
The facts as I know them now at a glance:
8 September 1942:
Letter that she is transported to Westerbrok:
10 September 1942:
Telegram from Westerbrok;
14September 1942:
Official date of death in Auschwitz.
48.
The first hiding place:
Bestevaerstraat 19 -high. Before that I was for a time
in the Bellamy- straat, anyway on the 11 August 1942.
Mutti must have disappeared around about my seventh
birthday.
Since that birthday fell on a Saturday (found on the
perpetual calendar) there is to think of a family member , in this case
certainly, that took me in because Olga had to report on Monday, 3 August 1942
at the Amstelveenseweg.
Then, on September 8, she writes that
she's " deported" to Westerbrok. That was a
"Wednesday". The telegram of September 10 was in vain. The next following day that the
train left to Auschwitz was Tuesday 14 September, the same date as her official
date of death! Indeed,
the trains always left on Tuesday?
That can mean two things. The first is that she did
not survive the journey . The second , that she indeed was “murdered” directly
when she arrived. However, it could mean , that she never arrived in Auschwitz
dead or alive….or never even left….
Help. I don’t understand!
Then in the
Bellamystraat…. Was I there for a short time by Hilda and did I
arrive on 11 August 1942 in the
Bestevaerstraat by Marie and Bart? Or at her parents?
In the Simon Sttevinstraat, in my memory a street
behind, I was by Marie and Bart.
Between 11 August 1942 and 15 December 1942, there is
a series of addresses. After the Simon Stevinstraat the Keizergracht. By whom?
After that the Prinsengracht, I also can’t remember . De Eerste
Leliedwarsstraat, in the middle of the Jordaan. A crooked house with sloping
floors.It stood under construction for many years. I remember that I must have been at a
cousin of my father. That
the sloping floor was broken and the furniture too and smelly. Wooden floor and
a damp stinking kitchen. The people there could not do anything about it : The
houses were not maintained. In a room lay a pile of patches or blankets, that
is where I slept. In another room there was a window that looked upon a house,
where Chinese people lived. Sometimes if I look outside and
saw the boys with their beautiful white shirts and their black trousers. I
found them soooo beautiful!
49.
After that in Hoorn , Keern number 32 or 24. A sister
of my father, aunt Bets, married with Aart den Ouden, three children. That was
a real family.I slept with their daughter in one bed. We went after the harvest searching
opium poppy. That was in the Kennemerland. The stubble in the country
short mowed grass caused bleeding legs and feet. How was
the reaction to that? I don’t know anymore. All that we
could find we put in the pants with
elastic in the legs and was given at
“home". Sometimes we kept apples or pears for ourselves and we eat them in
bed.
In the town center was a peacock cage and the school
was nearby.I went to the school with a neighbor boy, whose parents were
informants. This is less of a memory than what I was told later. The Germans
marched by our house, singing ”Auf der Heide bluht ein kleines Blumelein und
dass heisst Erika…” And me, with my
Austrian background pulled on the trouser leg of the sergeant and said: “Ikch
heiss auch Erika.” However,
on the shoulders of the Germans I've been several times to school. Then I was
soon gone from Hoorn.
Then I again ended up with Marie and Bart. In Amsterdam North, Vijfde
Vogelstraat 17. Marie
was hard. Father said that he had fled
from the “Arbeitseinsatz” and came home.
He lived a distance of twenty five meters away and came to visit me, and caught
Marie , just as she was giving me a beating. It must have been a hard quarrel
before he retrieved me and took me to grandpas. I was not allowed to see Marie
again. That was not necessary; I now had grandpa and the two neighbor boys Henk
and Erich. And I had the only happy half a year of my youth, since my mother’s
disappearance.
Marie took revenge and reported me. Probably at the Council for Child
Protection. On the 15 December 1943, a cold, wet, dark day, I was again removed
and brought to the Martha Foundation, then in Nieuwersluis.
Well, there
is a very clear result. That Rivka (Ella) has informed several times to me.
That I have interested! Family, only it never was told me.
What remained
was a lie. And denial. In this case, two different things. But that’s another
story.
I have
immediately written back to Ilse and told her that I have received a letter
from Olly. I hesitate to send her a copy of it.
6 November 1992
Dear Ilse,
I am writing
back straight away. Thank you very much for your letter. Now I can write back
to Schachter. I had already written
evidence about mother's death, but now I can explain to him how it is.
In the meantime
I have received a letter from aunt Olly. I will send you a copy, but hesitate
because she did not- how shall I say this- write so friendly about your mother.
Let me know if you wish to receive the letter-and you can.
As for me, I
want to find the truth. Olly is not so young anymore and it was a hectic time
then. But I must do it with hypotheses. These are often 'ouch'. Would I
however, be reconciled with the past, then I will have to continue for the time
being to write. A journalist friend wants to make a book of my quest. And the
KRO wants to dedicate a radio show to it.
This came about because of ads I've posted in the hope that there are
still people alive who knew Olga .
No, nil comma
zero reactions.
In the book
that I am writing, about the hiding, the Martha Foundation, and the like
are discussed, but mainly my search for
Olga.
Meanwhile I
have, thanks to you, a past back that is mine. A kind of wholeness, whereas
before my life began only in my early adulthood and all that had happened to
"another child named Erica '. You understand? Thanks again.
Wholeheartedly. We are getting closer, you notice that too?
Very cordial
greetings and until the next letter,
Erica
77.
Indeed, I am
aware that, where this story began as a personal process, it is now my mother's story. I think it is about the
fact that I want to know these things, she could have told me if she not- so
young - had been killed. Others, including Jessica, hear the stories of home
and about the past. That is the most normal thing in the world!! ouch- in this
paradise, that is called the
Netherlands.
It's very
selfish and I have never felt so self-centered and prepared. But I consciously
try the pain, the anguish, the misery and the flights and keep fleeing from day
to day all those millions.
Because I
have to live in my life. And so far it has not been.
Tomorrow
firstly I will write back to Schachter
and aunt Olly.
11 November
1992
The anniversary of Jacobs’s death. I am thinking back to that hopeless, terrible
day, six years ago. Looking for the poem that I wrote. And another, that I
wrote as I was mourning for Jacob in 1986.
78.
Jacob
I have known
you- and not known you my child
- I have a
picture of you, that is called Jacob;
And image of
rebellion, fury and suffering
That binds
you to my past.
I have built a picture of you, my child,
That put his
arms around me and held my hand.
Not the boy
who destroyed his life
But
one who finds life fearful and unlivable.
That scared
and angry and on the run
in life never found a shelter
and disbanded
from his fear by his death
I loved you,
my child that we knew.
And
powerless, I watched how you
have wounded
yourself so deadly.
Nieuwegein, 1986
79.
Who wants to
hear
how trumpeter
grief
Who will not
run away
for my
nocturnal crying….
Hear how the
land
shakes under
my feet thumping
looking
crying
Screaming for
my children....
their hunters
continue to
be injured
And flee
for my
boundless grief ...
About him and
his name
can turn
around
Flights as I
approach
come seeking
solace…..
I want their
names
not know him
forget
Never love
again no more
do not be
complicit….
Do not come
closer
I liked you
even trust
Again
memories
should be to
what was….
And who wants
to hear….
80.
11 November,
later
I still have
written the letter to Schachter. With "urgent" on the envelope.
Because in the mailbox was a letter from the 'Division for Personal
Commemoration,' say 'the department Commemoration of Persons ":
"We
propose to inform that one page witness statement to commemorate your loved
ones, family and friends, who lost their lives in the Holocaust, are added.
The Pages of
Testimony will be included in the computer and stored in the Hall of Names at
Yad Vashem. A second notice with the names registered shall be sent to you next
month. "
Yes, hasty
and erroneous data
12 November
1992
If I have
ever had the illusion that humanity has become wiser and better, it is now
absolutely over. At the time of Gorbachev, I still had hope. Ethnic and
nationalist wars that since robbery and especially in the 'civilized' Europe
have broken make me realize that humanity has learned nothing. I have always
expressed the opinion that the "masses" consists of individuals, who
each have their responsibilities with respect to themselves and their fellow
men. I take the view back without extreme bitterness, but with the sad
realization that it was an illusion. The "dumb masses indeed. The masses
seem to have a need for a negative individual, projecting above ground level,
head and shoulders. His pursuit the ideals of the global village? The only
thing that still exists thereof is the data of the news distributionA message
from the newspaper yesterday, a headline: 'Bosnia Muslims are actually
threatened with extinction. ‘
And the world
is watching.
Yesterday I
passed the pieces from my tray from the town hall. And immediately an alarm
bell was raised. For the new municipal
identitieskaart is a counterpart of what the (jew) got on the Ausweiss: an
asterisk with a number (eg * 76 468.) For Moluccans!
'Moluccans'
indeed have a 'special status' in the Netherlands. But the name and picture
together should be sufficient recognition? Along with the smear campaign
against so-called illegal immigrants gives me the conviction that the
"Ausweiss bitte," mandating us of wearing - and showing-
identification at any request is only a matter of time. And then the shift to the
right and nationalism also struck here. Because only 'real' Dutch have a
municipal identification.
Of course I
have taken the necessary steps. Also to get this publicity, but you have to
wait and see how it is picked up and whether one sees the danger.
Below the letter in translation I wrote to
Rabbi Schachter enclosing a copy of Olgas note, her telegram and the evidence
of her death.
11 November1992
Dear Rabbi
Schachter,
My heartfelt thanks
for your letter of 16-10-'92, but above all for your loving attention.
As you can
understand it for me indeed a shock to have read and found out that there is
already a Page. I needed a few days to get over the shock and to discover that
the story in the Page was wrong with the reality.
This morning
I received a note from the 'Division for Personal Commemoration,’ my mother is
registered on the basis of your story. Please, undo, it was too fast, too
hasty. I do not blame you, you were full of good intentions and truly believed
in what you found.
Truth is, I
send you:
1 An almost
illegible note, which my mother wrote on the way to Westerbrok on Wednesday 8
September 1942, to her sister Hilda. The original can be found in the
Resistance Museum in Amsterdam;
2 A copy of a
telegram that my mother sent to her sister from Westerbrok on September 10,
1942. The original of this is found in the Resistance Museum in Amsterdam;
3 An excerpt
from the municipality of Amsterdam, which shows that my mother, Olga Bock, was murdered in
Oswiecim (Auschwitz) in Poland, and that she was the daughter of Jozefa Karpfen
and Armin Bock. Also showing that she had been married to Jacob van Beek, my
father;
4 Finally, a
letter from the Dutch Red Cross information office.
The last two
letters I received, as you can see, already in 1963, when I was married with my first husband. They were the only
evidence, then, that I had, that she had ever lived. Many years later, when my
mother's sister died, I received that note and that telegram. And that was
that. Make from it your own story...
Now, after
receiving your last letter, I tried to get in touch with Ilse, the daughter of
my mother's sister. That sister survived and died about ten years ago. I
translate for you part of the letter I received:*.
Until there
the letter I received from my cousin.
When I
received your letter, I thought that I was crazy or had a wrong picture in my
mind of the past. It took a while before I realized that that was not the case
and that no second Olga Bock existed with the same background. One possibility
was then, that the Israeli cousin had her own story about my mother, which I
discovered, was true, as you see.
As for my father is the following. He was not
a Jew, but he did not get me after the war to take care of me.
*see page 74.
83.
Hilda would
not do that *, as I have discovered. So I had to stay in that very Christian
orphanage until I was 19 years old. And I had to forget everything (had
forgotten all) of my first childhood.
The truth
about my life and that of my mother is really complicated. I have to rediscover my past and my memories now.
That's why I try to write down on that quest, everything about that trip to the
past. A good friend, a journalist, is willing to make a real book. Not to get a
bestseller, but for my children, my ex-husband and my friends: who are
interested in my mental journey.
I hope you that you will give my mother the
ultimate right in the Page, to fill in the new found truth. This letter is the
report for The Hall of Names. I will be very grateful if you would change the
existing one.
A picture of
my mother and me as a little child (I have changed a bit over the past fifty
years) is now re-created and if necessary I will send it to you in due course.
The
unfamiliar uncle or cousin, I will not write, but maybe would you be so kind as
to tell him what I have written?
Finally, I
would like to express my greatest gratitude, and I hope you will write me back.
You are at this moment the thread that connects me to Yad Vashem, the place
where my mother will get a fair and beautiful place, where she is at home.
Yours
sincerely,
Erica
* Or had they
no authorization for that purpose? There is evidence? I could not find any..
84.
13 November
1992
Today the
papers are again full of terrible things that are happening in the former
Yugoslavia. Murders, mutilations, rapes.... How will the survivors continue to
live? Demonic primitiveness still requires an equally primitive response:
Bombard the so-called purified areas where Serbs live alone. A little each day
until they surrender. Naturally, hundreds of innocent will die, but on the
other hand maybe the horror finally ends and the other population group not
only feels avenged, but not otherwise is wiped out and can return to their
place. That is never going to be good between the people and the neighboring
countries. Now if there was only intervention! Before Muslims come to 'help'
from the Middle East. Oh, poor Yugoslavia, what should it be?
In the Netherlands there is still hope left.
Saturday, November 14 at the Tropical Museum in Amsterdam a meeting of the
Labour Party 'adorned' with a pocket
line of AFKA, Anti Fascism Committee Amsterdam, to show that not all the
Netherlands is behind the smear campaign against illegal immigrants.
Good, further
with my mental journey.
14 November
Yet to go
back to yesterday. The meeting of the Labour Party was due to 'circumstances
‘not in Amsterdam but in The Hague. And according to the, I would say,
naturally present ME, there was only fifty autonomists that demonstrated and
therefore naturally were beaten away and had to be arrested.
Fortunately
it penetrates to the media that the smear campaign against illegal immigrants
is wrong. Refugees or not, but everything is lumped together! An embarrassment
for politics? Am I not a voice of the people? Such things affect me deeply!
85.
Following is
the translation of the letter I wrote today to aunt Olly in London. In itself a
partial evaluation, actually only scheduled for late December.
Dear aunt
Olly,
Thank you
very much for your letter. It answered very many questions that I had all my
life. I am sorry that you know so little, but what you do know, brought back so
many memories again and made me aware again of many things.
This is a
very long letter, prepare yourself then for?
Ilse has also
helped me a lot.
I'm going to
tell what I remember, or have come to learn or have read.
My father,
Jaap, who died on 28 November 1976, has always told me that he continued to
love Olga his entire life. In 1938 (of'37), he begged Olga to marry him again,
for her own and my safety. She refused, probably left Vienna when he came there
and told him according to his own words, to marry Hilda, because she would,
with her two children need him a lot more. That would be the reason (can) he
married Hilda, according to him, just to help Hilda and her two children. I
suppose neither Olga nor Jaap knew anything about the fact that you would take her
with her two children to England. As it is told, Jaap went to Amsterdam and
Hilda soon followed. They had both before and during the war, often the same
address, but never lived together.
Olga and I
came back later to Amsterdam. As Hilda told Ilse, still a little
surprised: "She came sailing down
the Danube." Ilse had her own image
(by the way it was talked about)
from the book Uncle Tom's Cabin: Eliza, jumping from ice floe to ice floe on
the Ohio River, to escape the slave trader and to save herself and her child .
86.
It must have
been a very traumatic journey and an escape in the nick of time to Holland.
Jews were then no more allowed public transport, train or bus travel. I have no
memories of that, even though I was there. Never mind. I will leave it at that.
Maybe my fears, panics and bad dreams are the root cause.
When Olga was
taken away in August '42, she assumed that I was safe with Hilda, according to
the note she wrote just before she reached camp Westerbrok. Shortly after began my life as a so-called "Hidden
Child.” There followed a number of addresses, where I, as a Jewish child was
not really welcome. Until I came in the winter of '43 to that very Christian,
very cruel orphanage, where I remained until my nineteenth year. When I was 'free'
from there , I had to my knowledge no
other real family other than my father,
who over the years, faithfully visited me each visiting day. Oh yes, I knew
Aunt Hilda, Louis and Ilse, I had some relatives on Jaap's side, and to kill
some time I had visited them with Jaap (very rarely I had permission to go with
him for a few days in my summer holidays).But there was no family ties,
not with Hilda, nor with Jaap's side. I
also don’t remember anything about the brief encounter with you and Inge. There
must have been from the beginning simply too much sadness, anger and trauma in
me.
Now I have to deal with that past. There is
indeed much to forgive, especially Hilda, who during and after the war
abandoned me .Her child and she were quite safe because she was married to my
father, a non-Jew. Yet Ilse and Hilda sat in Westerbrok for a time, but came
out safely, through that marriage, I think. After the war, Jack and Hilda got
divorced straight away, so she could marry Louis.
The last
eleven years I have been very active for ‘disabled *’ for refugees, gypsies,
for society in all its forms.
87.
As a
volunteer. I had and have no ordinary pension. It is a pension for victims of
persecution, especially Jewish people. Just like my grandmother Joszefa (Ilse
wrote to me about her), a militant woman of the labor movement. I have even
been, for a number of, a member of the Communist Party of the Netherlands,
which no longer exists. I chose the wrong husbands and separated from them. The
wrong lovers and discontinued that relationship again. Now I'm grateful that I
live alone since my now adult daughter Jessica has left home.
Returning to
Hilda: I, but also, Inge and Kurt have her, I think, to forgive, a lot. I will
reach that pointof forgiveness in the near future. I am slightly conscious of
the fact that I'd never have been the same helpful woman, if things had turned
out otherwise. Do you understand what I mean? Life is just the way it is and
I've been through it, for whatever reason. We will have to accept and live our
lives. While the rest of the world is just about on fire. I agree with you,
that it is terrible.
Back to your
letter. I think it was the excuse that
Hilda could not get me back because she had been married to my father. * But I
want to believe that she was unable to bring me up because of everything that
had happened before and maybe Louis did not want me. Ilse has never been able
to understand this and despite her loyalty to her mother, she is in her heart
still angry, about much bigger things, but also because of me. I can understand
.
*however, it
may have been true. Only recently was it publicized in publications that the
Child Protection used that excuse at the time. Better Christian than Jewish,
they found.
88.
Now about
Olga. As I have discovered recently, the
following things happened:
-On September
8, 1942 she was released from prison in Amsterdam, where she was detained for
the simple fact that her 'star' was pinned instead of sewn. The Germans are
still very 'gründlich' as you know.
-On September
10 she sent a telegram to Hilda from
Westerbrok to send her the Aryan papers of Jack, but it was too late,
because
- On
September 11 '42 she died in Auschwitz. The journey lasted three days.
This is true
according to all the information that I have, official and informal. So that
should be accepted. She fortunately only suffered for a short time. And now I
am able to bury her, to give her a grave and a Page of Testimony at Yad Vashem
in the Hall of Names in Jerusalem, for the victims of the Holocaust. And now I
am able to remember my mother and some of my childhood. That heals me in a way;
it makes me whole, so to speak. A woman with a past that I previously could not
remember because of the terrible things that had happened. With "Today"
writing, thinking and remembering. And with a future, long or short, but worth
living.
That is what
I mean by ‘whole’. And perhaps cured, healed, through that journey into the
past itself. And at my age, 57 years old!
Only that
part of Hilda keeps crossing my mind. I'll have to think over and over, until I
can forgive her. Can you understand that? Oh yes, I have still something to
ask.
From what
Jaap has told me about Olga, about you and about Vienna, I always understood
that you and Olga were great friends.
89.
Maybe indeed
just because of the sports club, as you wrote. But really not above that level?
How is it that Jaap admired you so much, almost worshiped you? Only because of
your part in this tragedy in Vienna? Or because you were good friends with Olga
and her family? Her best friend, whom she trusted, like Hilda trusted in Olga?
Maybe Hilda was very much a dependent, very childlike and she could not make
decisions for herself or defend herself? You and Olga must have been strong
personalities, you were well-qualified sportswomen. Maybe she felt more or less
forced into what she did, first by Olga and others, later by Lois. My father
had therein little to say. It would explain a lot of things, if that was so.
Today,
everywhere with wars and misery in the world and especially in Eastern Europe,
with refugees, I am also not able to let
any of them stay in my house, legal or illegal. It would break me. Do
you understand what I'm saying? Oh, I want to reach that point of forgiveness!
Would you
please write me back? Even if you think you cannot really tell me anything of
what happened or cannot help me further.
Until then,
I'm still sincerely yours,
Erica
15 November
1992
So, that has
put everything nicely in a list. Albeit superficial , about my lovers is not
quite honest .Only one of them was a jerk and I realized that almost too late.
The one that I cannot mention here, still has a big place in my heart. Life
itself made and end to our relationship. And Paul, oh well. I loved him very
much, but we did not fit spiritually together.
90.
My frustrated soul could not bear his
affection towards his ex-wife and ex-girlfriends. Superficially seen, pure
jealousy. But it was not that alone. In a love relationship, I should feel
perfectly safe, and that I was not. I always enjoyed what he did, his writing
and his poetry; have learned everything I know of graphic art from him. But a
relationship, a lasting bond of love was something impossible. Fortunately, we
can now be close friends. Now I trust him so much that I have asked him to help
make this book.
A little
reminder comes up with a few notes during commercials.
Kommt ein Vogel geflogen
Setzt sich nieder auf mein Fuss
Hat ein Breifel in sein Schnabel
Von der Mutti ein Gruss
Leiber Vogel fleig weiter
Nimm ein Kuss mit und ein Gruss
Denn ich kann dich nicht begleiten
Weil ich hier bleiben muss
En dan
Hoppe hoppe reite
Wer da fallt der schreit er
Fallt er in den Graben
Fressen ihn die Raben
Fallt er in den Plumpf Macht der
Reiter ‘Humpf’
There will
sometime come back more songs. It shows that as a child I had singing and music
played to me. About that fact itself I remember nothing. At the Mulo we learned from our German
teacher songs like ‘Das Standchen’ from Schubert and Weihnachtslieder as ‘Schlaf wohl, du susser kleine du' that I
knew how to play at once and that just
came to my mind now. It was already in there! Strange, that it just comes to
mind now. Hey Erica, remain rational
91.
I have given
myself a bunch of phlox as a gift. It smells overwhelming. It is mid-November;
imagine it, an engine will not start from the cold and damp. I sit with my butt
almost touching the heater. Behind my back, it is almost winter and my nose
smells mid-summer. Crazy huh? That is only in this crazy frog country.
17 November
1992
Today was
again a puzzle of the past. First with
Dorine then later with Elma.
It is
impossible to continue to do this rationally. My throat is tight and my head is
spinning still. Tonight my girlfriend An was here play a game of dice. I've kept it inside until
now, a quarter past twelve at night.
Dorine and I
went back to two key questions:
1. How did Olga end up in jail? And
2. Hilda, with some difficulty could she
have kept me?
Olga was not
the type, that has now become clear that
would report under orders. It is possible that Hilda, Olga and I walked on the
street and were arrested by the (Dutch) police officer, if only because of the
stars. That Olga was picked from the street because her star was pinned. The
note makes it clear that Hilda knew! That makes Elma’s suggestion actually a
little off, that Olga was alone on the street. In the circuit to which Olga had
gathered around her there were only Jews (the names Schubert, mentioned
earlier, and Hirsch came back in my mind). They may have been someone else
walking in the street, who could have
escaped it and warned Hilda – at Olga’s
request. But the most likely explanation is still the first. They still had to
get their quantum of Jews? And she sat in a Dutch house of detention on the
Amstelveenseweg. It was at a time in the beginning of the straatrazzias, before
entire streets were taken away. Imagine how that happened. That I myself have
no reminder of that event, says nothing. Too traumatic things, at least to
me, are well shielded. But my heart is
pounding at this moment again from the fear: the most familiar and unwelcome
feeling of my life.
92.
Olga was
picked up by a Dutch policeman. They still had to get their quantum Jews? And
she sat in a Dutch house of detention on the Amstelveenseweg. It was in the
beginning of the street raids, before whole streets were picked up.
Imagine how that happened. That I myself
have no reminder of that event, says nothing. Too traumatic things, at least to
me, are well shielded. But my heart is pounding at the same time again of fear:
the most familiar and unwelcome feeling of my life.
Maybe I'll
get to do regression hypnosis before this book is finished. For all these
things to really face definitely.
Hilda again- according to Dorine and Elma
it is not impossible that Hilda was
really not assigned me by the OPK
(commission War Foster children) *. Because they thought that I was better off
at the Martha foundation than my own familiar family, who were not Christian.
And by a 'Pulse' had nothing more and had to start all over again. Hilda’s
guilt to Olga and later to me, rightly or wrongly - that I have no judgment on
may have meant that she later has not looked back at me. But also her character
and Louis could have contributed. I simply could not see into her heart and she
did not speak. In the next letter I write I will ask this of Aunt Olly and
Ilse. Hilda they barely knew, of course, I'm not sure if she made real trouble
for me. But those very "Christian" ladies and gentlemen of the OPK
and Child Protection Agency I can well imagine, there you need only to turn to
the book of Elma. If Hilda approached the Jewish members of the OPK, also
remains a mystery. For eternity. Okay, I want to give her the benefit of the
doubt; she has not had it so easy.
* A committee
consisting of mainly non-Jewish, very Christian people.
93.
Yet..... Why?
But that's
what life is sometimes, Erica. Tomorrow I will call Hedda van Gennep for more
background information on those months in '42.
A comforting
word for tonight, tomorrow is my daughter here to eat and we go happily to the
world shop, to buy groceries.
18 November
1992
My daughter
now has read everything and actually without comment laid down the books.
I see how
important I think how she experiences it. Well, for her it is the history, the
intricate story of her mother's childhood and family. She finds it, like
Dorine, that I am changing throughout the process. I myself don’t have that
feeling yet, though I hope that it comes. Apart from Dorine I still cannot
really talk about it. It is, really complicated and the distance remains.
A result must
be, that I learn to trust again. And not to build a facade of self-awareness
and self-confidence in my personal contacts. With Dorine I can let go of it,
proud and happy with what I do and did and have achieved. With others I can
never talk about it, if it concerns me at least. About the work I did and do I
myself feel good, but I always feel as a sort of middleman and know exactly who
does things better. It has for example resulted in the identification of the
appropriate chairman of foundation * Property, which actually does it better
than I would ever do it. Or initiating and defending things that I really believed
in, but where others had to play the responsible role. Further I stay humble in the background, , and allow others the honor
that I get sometimes.
*An
organization for the sole purpose of obtaining its own global center.
Am I chaotic-
still- to a demanding task with responsibility for me to take? Or am I just
"shy"?
94.
Put me in a
room with eight hundred anonymous, it goes well. But personal contacts, with
all the warmth I feel for those people. I often hyper- ventilate. And I notice
that only when I am alone again. I realize it's not just a matter of
misanthropy, despite all the social skill.
The underlying cause is distrust in honesty of
others towards me. A wrong expression, glance or a curt answer, and I am gone.
Feel (again) rejected. Something from earlier time. I distrust such a person
for a very long time. Uncertainty. Anxiety. Fear that they see through me. That
is why I seek the attack: If you think "That man is crazy," I am at
that time also. But it passes by itself.
The knowledge
of the past, of all that misery, leading to fear, significant uncertainty,
anxiety, that leads to depression does not help. It realized that again today.
Will that
also get better? It hinders my real development; it keeps me in second or third
place. Not that I'm ambitious. But it's a false modesty, and resulting from
fear to really stand out. It's something from the hiding and the Martha
Foundation. How do you overcome something like this? and is that really
necessary? Am I not so terribly tired of that eternal struggle with myself,
that I see ghosts? And am I not ready to take a step back and not take on
challenges or cross barriers anymore? That is the easy path. No fear of people,
personal contacts with the rest of the "family," which are not going
well currently. And no friends? I surely think to have. How uncertain and tense
that I am. It's not a solution, to become a nun? A hermit? Just now that I'm
complete? But what and how?
95.
I not called Hedda van Gennep yet. Fear, like
with Elma, there again those fears. It was long before I was through that with
Elma, too long. How is it that I do not have that with Dorine? I then stay
rational? In the time.
I myself
think that it might have to do with being prepared. You do not feel robbed,
despite your questions.
Today
Memorboek has arrived. ‘The plate’s atlas of the life of Jews in the
Netherlands from the Middle Ages until 1940’. A book almost as large and as
thick as the King James bible. All the pages reveal that this history is also
mine. I despite my not – believing but still a real Jew, unlike, yes, then
what? That I'm closer to that side than the Dutch side that represents my
father. Not so crazy, apart from the biological provability, to be a child of a
Jewish mother still being Jewish!
I made it
again today. In a regional meeting of the Association of Dutch Municipalities
over municipal global policy. I suddenly got the economist Adam Smith (right
and pure capitalist) under my nose pushed through by a VVD lady: "The
public interest is most profitably encouraged where each individual can freely
pursue his own interests."
I fumed with
rage, literally. So the world is not like that. The law of the jungle prevails
and only the strong will always be at the expense of the weak, which will never
be unimpeded or even could aspire. Think about this "Global Village,"
which is our world. I ask her this, as controlled as possible, 'How big - do
you think - is the percentage of people in our ‘Global Village ', that can
freely pursue their own interests? And is that – ethically speaking -own
interest not only appropriate to the smallest common denominator?'
She did not
answer, but came afterwards to me to talk about it. I said- it was in the
meeting a municipal global policy, east- west and north-south relations - East
and West should never meet here because she was a follower of Adam Smith and I
of Marx.
96.
Again there was silence, and then she said:
"But that does not mean that we have to hate each other, right?" No
it does not, but friends? At such a moment I feel again at one with the
persecuted, the oppressed, that is where I belong. Among the Jews, the Jewish
Marx, as well, if I'm honest, all oppressed peoples that come up in revolt who
flash through my mind.
Links dead? No, but left and right do not let
the back of their tongue be seen, in order not to arouse resistance? Or are we
becoming a- political?
I should in the future be more wary of the
individual motives and self-interest, which should be pursued because in the
approach of the right it cannot go differently in practice, than at the expense
of the oppressed, in my feeling. The making of a new political awareness?
Hey discovery?
Sticking to
the old values, which I - unconsciously have ingested and have tested the
breast milk and found to be correct in my adult life, Jewish huh? This is ebbing my anger.
Every day a
thread is a shirt sleeve in the year.
20 November
1992
I was putting
away my cart. An elderly man was looking about in a panic. I had seen him
before in the store when I was picking out Sharon fruit and he wanted to know
what kind of fruit it was.
It turned out that he had lost his bag of
groceries. Just put down to clear away the trolley.
97.
My
presumption that one of the clerks had taken the bag to the office, proved
correct. Radiant he appeared moments later with his bag. I had waited for the
results. He said that this was the third time and I warned him not to put down
his messages unattended anywhere. Anyway, I thought I'd go now, good evening
sir. My attitude turned out, in the mall, to make a volcano of misery. He had
been in a Japanese POW camp and was badly beaten. He had never seen his father and mother again. And
when he had found his brother, he also appeared to have died. Terrible, but he
had also been married for more than forty years and also his wife had died five
years ago. He had remarried and his second wife worked very long days so he did
the housework and shopping. A whole life just popped out there. I felt so
terribly small, to see such a man wipe away his tears. I should have left
earlier, but had to do with him. He also had a war pension, and ... Well ...
How do you make something like that loose?
21 November
1992
Today a
Womans Workshop by Women in Peace in Cunera. A long day over the former
Yugoslavia, the war in Bosnia. I had in my workshop a group leader a former Yugoslav. Can you imagine such a
thing.... they can never return. Lived here now for eight years. Family:
Bosnians, Serbs and Croats, both Christians (Orthodox and Catholic) as well as
Muslims. Everyone fought against everyone. Who is not dead or wounded, has
deserted spouse and family. The frenzy of lust, macho men that bring resentment
up thirteen centuries to find alibis for their bloodlust. The male scientists
that sit at the top, not politicians, along with the military, unscrupulous
murderers than anyone else in the world after Hitler. Those men. That anger in
me. I must do something with it.
98.
In the
plenary session an appeal was made to the existing female MPs to accommodate
orphans and children of Serbian raped women in Dutch homes. That made that I,
no microphone, shouted: "And what when those children grow up?" At
first it did not go down well, but later, at the end, when I went to say
goodbye to the chairman jantien Achtseribbe, she revealed that she and Leoni
Spikes had understood me very well. They will try to keep the kids there.
Jantien told me that she was married to a Jewish man (I had my star on) and
understood me. What was somewhere in the back of my mind for a while, I
realized when I was in the rain bringing a few letters to the mailbox.
My father
told me; long ago that Olga had come for the first time to the Netherlands to
find work. I do not know whether she had any qualifications. Maybe she was just
very good at sports, who knows. So she came to The Hague, where a couple had
'hired' her, perhaps as a housekeeper like Olly, or a maid. She therefore came
as "illegal," for economic reasons here.
That night
the "Mr. and Mrs." Said that she must make herself beautiful, because
they would receive visitors. One way or another, she realized that she had not
come to an ordinary house, but a closed brothel and she managed to escape
through a window. She must have already known my father. How? Through a
socialist youth group? Or perhaps through international exchange, so then not
"illegal"? At least she had fled (already) from The Hague to
Amsterdam, to my father or to other members of that group. Shortly thereafter
she became naturalized by marrying my father.
That was on
18 October 1933.
On 1 August
1935 I was born and in the beginning of '36, she must have returned from Vienna
with me. Until autumn and winter 1938, witnessed the photos, in winter clothing
which were taken in Oosterpark or Sarphatipark in Amsterdam.
99.
Between
August '35 and Fall '38 they must therefore have been divorced, when Jaap could
marry in Vienna Hilda. Olly can now write that they did not know whether my
parents were then divorced, but my father certainly was not a bigamist.
Besides, the story is in that regard is clear enough. Moreover, I have a lawyer
and attorney, Plantage Middenlaan 88, in the center of Amsterdam, with a
telephone number. Probably the divorce lawyer from when we were still living in
the Czar Peter Street. So close by.
Another
couple of links to the chain. Or beads on the cord? We are now waiting for the
letter, which has to come from Aunt Olly.
What else do
I need to get past some of letting myself be? Not everything has been worked
out, nor on paper or in my head.
100.
Erica in
Amsterdam
101.
The scrap of
paper from Mr. Cooper
102.
The two
issues from my earliest childhood are still the flight from Vienna to
Amsterdam, and the abrupt divorce of my mother.
From the
time, to the end of the hiding I can figure out the facts, which were a
predominant feeling of darkness and cold. Except for a few sunny memories from
Hoorn. The Martha Foundation, surely in Nieuwersluis has certainly brought
memories above which all the children of that time living in the west of the country must have had. And
besides that also the memories of the
house itself, the garden with its, lightning struck cedar, the lawn by the
pond, where we caught and made frogs 'tame', where we made from reed, skirts.
The owner and
his wife, who returned to their own country seat after the war, I visited
sometime around '85, to seek the past in a first attempt. They were old and
then accused me (!) that we, the children of the war had made a hole in their
hedge and that hedge was never properly mended. That was that. I had no
opportunity to see something of the house or the garden, but a weak cup of
coffee and a biscuit. Very genteel poverty.
Martha
Foundation in Alphen: a lot beatings, punishment and tasks, surviving
unconsciously, belittling and never being the best of the class. In the group I
was the worst and slowest, especially at stopping socks and knitting worsted
stockings. 'Snail' van Beek, apparently no one cared anything about her,
according to stories I heard decades later.
Yet also some
nice memories: I told ghost stories, later, to my peers, when we were in bed
and had to be quiet. I taught them dances and was very creative with beautiful
pieces of material and cardboard and paper, for example, I made diadems for the
hair. The kindergarten, how is it possible, nevertheless it bore its fruit. In
the memories of others I was a very serious, rarely smiling girl.
In my early
memory games pink rubies (or what I mistook thereof) encased in a brooch in the
shape of a bouquet, played a role.
103.
Last week
there was an art and curio market here, striking, especially as art deco
porcelain and old dusty materials evoke nostalgic feelings in me. And by one
stall there was a brooch that did not belong there. Strasz pink rhinestones, a
bouquet with blackened metal and bronze-colored stalks. I loved it; it called a
lot of old, good feelings awake. But it was expensive at fifty guilders. I
lingered at the booth, ostensibly to look at other things. The salesman then
said suddenly, "Good lady, for ten guilders, then." Well, I got it
and am still happy with it, though it is perhaps not even worth the tenner.
Every time I see that brioche, I think of the pink rubies, which I had found as
a child so lovely. I have placed it on the list with my mother’s photo.
Yesterday I
was in a curio shop in Utrecht and for
five guilders I bought a very old book. A
probably first published in Dutch version of the book by
Beecher Stowe: The negerhut. A translation of Uncle Tom's cabin. With the original engravings "to the twentieth
American printing from the English translation." On page 59 the engraving
with Eliza, fleeing across the ice! A publication of the Gebr. E. and M. Cohen, Amsterdam.
24 November
1992
I'm too
impatient and thereby make the receipt of the facts more important than their
processing. Certainly in terms of my own life. I'm still waiting for three
drawn lines:
1. Answer
from Jerusalem;
2 Answer from
London;
3 KRO radio
with Kalien Blondes.
A fourth,
entirely in the background hit point, a new appointment with Margreet about
the Martha - Foundation.
Meanwhile, I
am again eager to take action. In the Platform Modiale Awareness. With an
action for the former Yugoslavia, where
I have plotted the lines. I will convene a meeting to do something on
behalf of AFKIN* and the Federal Food Bond attracts harder: Women Committee,
work group "International Solidarity."
I'm going to
start another book, where I can write about my work now to keep everything in
perspective, only for myself.
Why am I
still doing all this? Why do I not live a good life with my small pension, like
other people? Come on, I know the answer after all. If I was brought up as most
people with the same background, in the safe bosom of a loving family, I was
maybe barely aware of a different world than my little safe world.
It's just my
own traumatic life that has made me aware of and empathetic to the trauma, the
fears, and the world of others. And if I can do something with it, for example
by writing about it, then surely that is a bonus? Even though I sometimes get
the feeling I am found to be a little
crazy, a voice in the wilderness. But if I keep quiet, I feel indeed
responsible. As with writers, journalists, protest singers and artists I have
my own way to express my dismay about the horrors of our time. And maybe too
emotional, but that is the way I happen to be.
26 November
Dorine
called. In the form of Yad Vashem was indeed stated in Hebrew "Olga Bock,
house wife, two children, shot in the street by a German officer because she
did not have her star on. In Amsterdam. Married name and name of parents
unknown. "
Tragically,
so many inaccuracies!
Well, Olly
knew even better than I was saved by nuns! How nameless and unwittingly can a
person live and die! Dear Mutti that after fifty years of your life and death
I can give you a name! Is that not a
miracle?
* The
anti-fascist committee of Nieuwengein
105.
Tonight I
find the courage to call Hedda van Gennep. She confirmed Elmas suspicion that
Olga was alone when she was arrested. And that the Dutch police or the home
front did it. She has seen it happen, that she and her mother were arrested and
her mother was beaten in the street because she was wearing a box for her star.
By Nederlanders- in uniform!
So.... I have
never taken leave or said goodbye. Pfff ... and Mutti was gone.
And then my
daughter Jessica came bye, for a quick cup of coffee.
Hedda gave me
the telephone number of the National Institute for War Documentation. When Olga
was arrested and held prisoner and deported to Westerbork, I can maybe find
something about it there.
Today I
submitted a proposal for the Platform Global Awareness on support actions for
Bosnia. An amount per capita for joint financial operations and public action,
for games, work and labor for the Yugoslav displaced centers. Who are bored
silly, they do not speak our language, sit together and the only distraction
they have is the TV that news from home will bring, in their language. I wonder
if mayor Laan will positively pick this up. That was point 2. Point 1 is
realized on 10 December, and next week, Ad, a good friend, is here with me and
we will work on the content of the magazine Global, the periodical that the platform are going to send out around 15
December.
This weekend to realize point three!
106.
With the 'reconstruction' of my book case I
come again across the white ceramic jar with lid, wherein sits a packed piece
of stone from Auschwitz, that a friend of Renco, my ex-husband, specially
brought for me. That now can get an honorary place.
Will I be
able once again to visit there, as in Vienna, or at Yad Vashem, there to find
my mother's name?
First search
in Westerbrok barracks 41/0.
Bring
telegram.
And fetch the
photo of Olga and me at the photographer.
27 November
1992
The
photograph is collected. The price was 90% better than expected, the print was
disappointing. A bit flat and smooth compared with the yellowed original. Too
bad, but she seems to look younger in it though.
Surprise!
Paul was suddenly in front of me; he came for the second book. It was fine,
again to exchange so many things with him. There remains much old camaraderie.
He has grown and now goes (a little) in depth; even with emotions he dares to
talk about and show a bit. Something where he used to be closed about and a
thunder cloud formed over him, "Life is good, right?" He is a
complete man to be. And so I should prefer him throughout.
We also
talked about the reason for writing. Identity crisis? Yeah, maybe but I had no
feel for my identity. And when we entered into a relationship, he wanted me
holding that identity, gave no meetings or work to be with him. That would
oppress him. No, now I understand that.
What am I
still glad that we can talk and write all about these misunderstandings. Now I
also told him that it was apparently still my nature to efface myself away for
the man I loved. And that was a huge threat to the adventurer who Paul wants to
be.
107.
I thought it
was not so much a question of identity, but also and above all that I no longer
came out after Elma’s book and the conference ‘The hiding child,’ to finally do
and want to know the unwitting and the
unsaid things from the past and from to speak, albeit on paper. This quest for
knowledge and words became the mission of my life. More important to me than
anything I did earlier in my life for that unconscious burden I had to explain.
And previously used to hide behind for intimacy behind a so transparent wall.
Now I can
talk, I can tell Paul all. There's a little sadness, because I could not
before. Now he could understand why I was how I was. But would he though have
coped? I do not think so.
Regarding the
OPK where Elma wrote about: there is a note found in an archive box from the
Martha foundation, which said that the Germans gave permission to take me in at
the Martha foundation. That could, to me it is clear, also have been falsified
by the "resistance", to let me be safe hiding there. Finally there
were more Jewish children.
More research necessary.
30 November
1992
The RIOD *
called. Annemiek van Boxmeer. She has heard the whole story, but already knows
that there is no available data on the way my mother was arrested, the time she
has sat and so forth. All details of the houses of detention in Amsterdam from
the war are now destroyed. This also means that no Dutch police man has become
accountable for his conduct in the war. I will send a letter to Mrs van Boxmeer with all the relevant
information about my mother and she will very carefully look at what data
whatsoever.
*National
Institute for War Documentation
108.
In Westerbrok, she said, are found personal
things of the people that were there. I do not think however that I will find
anything there; she was there only three days.
By RIOD it is maybe also possible to find out how she died: on the
train, on arrival or in the gas chamber. On the note that was found at the Free
University for my inclusion at the Martha foundation: they consider it quite
possible that it was falsified by the resistance. But I have to search that out
at the university.
Moreover, I
am this weekend truly active for society. I have written participation notes
for Wednesday, December 2nd in the ABZ- committee (of Administrative Affairs)
and therefore will speak about the municipal identity card. Moluccans will be
put separately therein. I do not agree to that and just cannot! I will try to stop it.
And there is
a silent vigil scheduled on December 24 because of the smear campaign against
illegal immigrants, where a piece I wrote will appear in the Molenkruier, our house-to-house newspaper.
I have also
already the participate notes in January, the police report will be addressed
in the ABZ- Commisssion. Wow ... now nothing more please.
109.
December
110.
111.
1 December
1992
Yesterday I
talked to Elma. I have found at the
Nieuwengeinse recycling center New Work, two books that I thought would be
something for her. If she, as a journalist, needs for investigations or needs
old newspaper photographs, Our Beautiful Life, 100 years newspaper photographs
(Dutch) and a visual report with newspaper pictures of the great woman strike
on 8 March '81 may be useful. She is, I believe, happy with them. Next week I
will bring them.
Elma said something that has stuck: I would
have to look Olly up in London personally. I can still do that, but I feel a
threshold. In a letter I can confront her with the past, but can I do that in
person? And then, I would see it as climbing a mountain. The night before I
dreamed of her and saw her as an old lady suffering with swollen legs. She is
no longer so hardy, she needs time. To write back. So I interpreted the dream
for myself.
I have
gotten from New Work also a book of
Meyer Sluyser that I did not yet have :
There is growing grass in Weesperstraat and Leonard de Vries: Chaverien, is that a children's book?
I will hear
from Dorine if the library of the JMW (Jewish Social Work) has interest in
them. No mail from abroad.
3 December
1992
For a few
days I'm overly nervous again. Not just because of the participation in the
evening yesterday ABZ * - commission over the identity card of the Dutch
Municipalities. I was sure of my case and have also been vindicated. That card
is not, at least for now, going ahead!
* General
Administrative Affairs
112.
Where from then? Afraid because I go against
the established order? Mayor Laan personally assured me about that matter. Why
then? The weather, the high moon, the constant low pressure area? Causes that
are mentioned more frequently in the past.
When Flik was
mayor here, I did open my mouth as needed. He took me quite seriously and I had
forgotten that I now have good-will on the city council. But that may not be
the only reason for my stress.
Perhaps
waiting for an answer from London? If that still will come? One reason to
consider sending a postcard about it?
No post from London.
No post from Israel.
8 December
1992
Finally! Post
from London and from Jerusalem!
The last
pieces of the puzzle begin to fall into place. Tomorrow I will tell you
everything. Now just as the overriding emotion when I read the translation of
the registration of Yad Vashem. "I ask you to give the survivor a"
posthumous citizenship "of the state of Israel, the undetachable sign of
solidarity with the Jewish people." She belongs there. I belong there.
Never before have I felt so Jewish. At heart and inseparably attached. Even
though the fact that the only attachment is to the JMW and Dorine, who let me
feel through the years that I belong. With no family, I am more a part than
with my children. Still I belong, with the Jewish people for centuries and until
the end of time.
It became
just too difficult, there were tears.
Mutti, you're
nearly home. Then you may rest in peace
and this task is accomplished. "Ein schon Leich '* is made, a beautiful
funeral. Who knows, I may be I will bring you. And otherwise I will visit you
in Jerusalem at Yad Vashem. It is almost 1993, and since I do not speak Hebrew
nor ever observed the Jewish calendar, I raise my glass of herbal tea and say,
"See you next year in Jerusalem."
113
9 December
1992
Now it will
begin with the letters from Aunt Olly and Rabbi Schachter. I will start with
the second. The first is so difficult, so traumatic, that I have read it bit by
bit. And yet still I collapsed.... Sick with the shock, first with anger, a lot
of grief and rebellion later. I'll be back to the translation, if I can muster
up the strength today.
Later that
day. Rabbi Schachter writes:
Dear Mrs. Van
Beek,
I was on a
visit abroad, hence the delayed response.
I was very
touched by your thoroughness and your desire to correct the registration of the
memoir, while my concern was not to further traumatize and bring you in touch
with family.
I enclose
some forms for you to register your mother and possibly other family. It will
be clear that we cannot destroy completed prior Pages of Testimony, we can add
a memo or note there with a reference to the 'added Pages in 1992, for example,
which will lead to your corrected Pages.
Fill in the
form attached, please; address it to me so that I can add the Red Cross letter
and your letter there when I have received them.
Yours
sincerely,
Rabbi J Schachter '
* Yiddish
114
The form is
filled in; I just need to wait a few days for a small copy of the photograph of
Olga and me to send.
And now,
there is no escape: the letter from Aunt Olly.
Dear Erica,
I wish I
could answer questions, but maybe at my age of 85 I forget a lot, or I did not
know a lot of things when they happened. I'm surprised your father seems to
have known me. I've never met him! Olga was really no more than a colleague of
the "Arbeiter Turn Verrein. She walked to Holland , I believe, before
Hitler's woes began in Vienna? Are you born in Holland? I was so happy to meet
here, Miss Palmer, a lady who wanted to guarantee my parents, Hilda and her two
children! But Hilda preferred to marry Jaap and go to Holland, Instead of
becoming a maid servant like me , and the children arrived with a
Kindertransport 'here and lived with an English couple. It took ten months
before I was given Inge to stay here with my parents and later with me. I do
not know whether Ilse knows these facts, but do not tell her, please.
Another fact
is that Olga BORROWED the jacket with the star pinned from Hilda. It was
Hilda’s cloak! I hope Ilsa and Inge never hear this. Please, let them never
know!
Erica, please
try to forget what has happened. Forget and forgive!!
I admire you
for.....
Furthermore,
I cannot go now.....
So this was
the big secret that has remained hidden for fifty years. Olga had worn Hilda’s
jacket briefly.... and she was gone.
115
And the guilt
and shame later on have assaulted Ilse and me.
Fifty years!
Fifty years straight it was hushed, nobody wanted to talk about my mother with
me, everyone has told me to leave the past alone. Also to Ilse. She would’ give
her mother sorrow ‘by asking questions. No, she would know the secret and maybe
tell me. That shame, guilt, we have carried our whole life, we did not know
what!
That anger
over the fate unknown, but no less felt, has given me and Ilse in our
adulthood, crisis dragged into crisis. How do you translate the moaning, the
pain that is felt in your head to your toes, the flow of adrenaline, which can
destroy your body, into words! Give me those WORDS!!
Hilda had
thus lost her cloak, the cloak that killed my mother, and that fifty years long
has covered everything, even my life.
Tell me how I
translate this literal pain in written sentences and I'll write a book thicker
than Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses and heavier than the Torah and the State
bible together.
How do I make
the story in question to look like something that remains credible for myself?
Here it looks like a bad novel, with fictional personalities. But it's true. It
really happened! This was my life. And that of my mother.
I have to
pick myself back together. And continue to write.
For hours I
postponed it. I have tried everything: telephone calls, including Paul, talked
to Jessica, lounging before the TV, to come to my senses. With Dorine yesterday
I tried to place it in perspective in the context of that time, especially into
perspective...
Same day,
very late. Now I finish the letter of Olly.
116
I admire you
because you have led such a strong, useful life and are still so helpful. That
must have been partly because of your Christian education. *
I have
nothing to forgive Hilda of. After my
visit with Inge to Holland Hilda wanted
Inge and Kurti to live with her,
and Louis, with whom she was not married at the time. He must have been a good,
decent man, that he not only accepted Ilse, but also to take the two children
in. To help her, he even married her. I begged Hilda to be allowed to keep Inge
with me for two years so she could finish her education . Hilda refused that.
In any case, it seems that she gave up the
struggle for the children, including the conflict with the Jewish refugees
commitee that protected the children. And nobody saw or heard anything about it
afterwards .....
Yes, Erica,
the bitter times that you have gone through in your life have made you what you
are now. A brave, compassionate person. Try not to think of the past; enjoy
your still relatively comfortable life
now, as I do. I try not to take note of what is happening around me in the
world (I know that's very selfish, but in my 85 years I have no more fighting
spirit in me). I live with my cat Shelly quite satisfied, waiting for Inge's
weekly letter. I hope that the treatment of Allen (Inge's husband) is helping
to fight his cancer. He recently had an operation and is doing well and
hopefully for quite a long time. Their three daughters live in England, but I
only see Sara occasionally. Kate lives in Sheffield, so quite far away. I
rarely see her. Helen shows no interest in contact with me. I have not seen her
since my eightieth birthday.
Well, dear,
you do well. Do not think too much about what has happened and make the best of
life. All good wishes,
Aunt Olly
* How did she
work that out?
117
Well, all
good spirits, help me! What should I answer the old lady? She means it
apparently so well; all my questions about my mother, she has indeed answered,
as far as she could. The conclusions are indeed my own responsibility.
From the
shock, I write my first spontaneous reaction in fluent German. Afterwards I do
not send it, it was too hard for her.
I shy off,
for the umpteenth time. Go to sleep.
10 September
1992
I put aside
everything today to be well prepared for the establishment of the Platform
Global Awareness. Two weeks ago, I submitted a proposal to give a 'flying
start' to this Platform. Aid to Yugoslavian
displaced persons in the Netherlands and an amount per capita to be
voted by the council, for the large joint fundraising (rural) to Somalia and
Bosnia.
I can cry
now. So I do it. After a little playful opening speech of the mayor, we
continued the meeting. And all official events were treated as the drafting of
an annual plan, joint events, bylaws etc. Nothing came out of the paint.
Participants
walked away. When barely half was over, my proposal was on the agenda. All I
wanted was my name swept underneath the platform and then to the City Council.
Well, you cannot expect in such a situation that the point is also discussed
but equally serious. The next meeting is late January. And then I have to come
up with a concrete proposal. As if this was not practical. And others thought
again that they first had to talk with their supporters about it, while the
Platform is designed precisely to take independent decisions. They have, it is
clear, no idea, what it's like to sit in the war.
118
Oh, next
month the need is still there?! Yes, and the fact that they are there left in
the shelters by us, let down this winter, means nothing. And that belongings
and money will only be available next year (maybe) is less important than a
rich regulatory conduct of meetings. I was so angry and bewildered that I'm
seriously thinking to do the whole action and only in a personal capacity. But
I just cannot physically and mentally. I have even taken on working for a
torchlight vigil on December 24 against xenophobia and smears against refugees.
So this was
the big disappointment today. The leaflet Globally, that this time must be
written exclusively on the Ad control, was again nice. I have written for that
a very small article and controlled and corrected it. On Saturday the
volunteers market and on Tuesday is the AFKIN- meeting.
I know I'm
doing it myself, but I would love to continue to do everything, writing,
mourning and work. Help!
That
participation in the ABZ- committee has been a great success! National
newspapers and the Utrecht’s newspaper wrote about it. Elma was not allowed
to, but did have contact with the
consultative body of Moluccan Welfare and Lilipali from the parliament. That
has raised questions for the minister. The VNG downplayed the case, as
uncertainty of Mayor Laan. I was able to bring him the parliamentary question
and wait for the answer from The Hague.
That's my
life.
But I long to
be again, completely busy with the past, with myself, so that I have written
this all. Hey ... it is with a feeling
that I, in this way have been able to tell about my mother.
The spirit
goes where it will- there for her no time, no distance. She moves in other
dimensions, other people, other times and conditions. Provided that it is
willing to be empathetic.
Here I sit, I
can do nothing else, and who wants to go with me?
119
It could have
happened like this.
It's August,
1942. It is a warm day, threatening to storm. Olga and Erica go to Olga’s
sister Hilda, who has a baby. That is not easy at the time, raising a baby.
Olga has a
star, a Star of David on her dress. She did not have a coat on; it's the height
of summer. If small Erica also wears a star? I do not know.
At the end of
the afternoon the sky darkens, but nevertheless it's not raining yet. Hilda
discovers that she needs something for the baby. Milk? Flour? Or the teat is
broken, or the bottle ....
And Olga
offers to quickly go and get it. Quickly , because it is nearly curfew. Then
there should be no more Jews walking about outside ... because the air is so
threatening she calls to Hilda: " I just put on your coat "and
leaves.
And then she comes upon a Dutch policeman or a
border guard, who sees a yellow star and from that liberty takes hold of this
young and attractive woman. To his pleasure and her terror the star was not
sewn, but pinned. That is for him the reason, that he, under threat with his
gun-there were stories that she had been shot dead on the street, but that was
not true - to arrest her and confine her in prison.
At home
waiting, in increasing panic, Hilda and the little Erica. And as it gets later
Hilda is more certain that Olga has been arrested. Because she did not have the
star sewn on her coat but had fastened it with safety pins.
It takes days
before they are assured. It lasts until September 8 before she receives a note
from Olga herself, who is currently on route from Amsterdam to camp Westerbrok.
Olga tries to encourage her sister even at that time. But on September 10 she
sends from Westerbrok a telegram in panic to Hilda, asking her to send the
"Aryan" papers from her ex-husband, it does not help. The next day,
September 11, she is stowed in the lorry, to Auschwitz, where she is
immediately killed upon arrival.
120
And then she
comes upon a Dutch policeman or a border guard, who sees a yellow star and from
that liberty takes hold of this young and attractive woman. To his pleasure and
her terror the star was not sewn, but pinned. That is for him the reason, that
he, under threat with his gun-there were stories that she had been shot dead on
the street, but that was not true - to arrest her and confine her in prison.
At home
waiting in a great panic, Hilda and the little Erica. And it is getting more
certain that Olga has been picked up. Because she had not sewn on her coat the
star, but had fastened it with safety pins.
It takes days
before they get affirmation. But it is not until September 8 before she
receives a note from Olga herself , who is under way at that time from Amsterdam
to Westerbork. Olga tries to reassure her sister even at that time with
courage. But on September 10 she sends from Westerbrok a panicked telegram to
Hilda, asking her to send the "Aryan" papers from her ex-husband. It
does not help. The next day, September 11, she is stowed in the lorry, to
Auschwitz, where she is immediately killed upon arrival.
120
For Hilda the
nightmare would now have begun. This is irrevocably the last time that Olga can
help her. In fact die for her.
What should
she now do with the little Erica? It is as hard as it is with the baby.
Fortunately, Erica also has a father, an 'Aryan' father still, who, to
complicate the story, at that moment ‘for appearances’ is married to Hilda.
Naturally he is divorced from Erica’s mother. His father, Jack, has a brother
who is recently married. And they want to look after Erica.
But if Olga
does not return- and nobody knows whether she will- it becomes even more
difficult. Erica then suddenly becomes a Jewish child, a risk. And then the
wanderings of the child starts from hiding - to hiding place, until no one
knows anymore and she is back at her aunt and uncle on the sidewalk.
Where is
Erica’s father at that time? It appears
that he is sent to work in Germany until he manages to escape in the summer of
1943. He is "married" with Hilda and according to the Registers and
Population of the town hall they live at the same address, but actually he
lives with his father, Erica’s grandfather.
When he,
after his escape, will look for his daughter and arrives at his sister in law ,
that's just at a moment when they are "beating" Erica (his words,
many years later). After a violent argument he takes his child to his home,
where she has a few wonderful months. The only good time actually in her
childhood, when she became an adult, could fondly look back.
That sister
in law has not let it sit. Jaap show no signs of gratitude that she has been
part of the child's fate, especially since she was still a Jewish child.
Instead, he has quarreled with her, added her reproach and 'just' captured the
child. Calling for revenge? She can, so she turns to someone from the Council
for Child Protection, "because it's inexcusable that such a small girl
grows up by two men, moreover, it is a Jewish child.’’
121
The latter must
have been difficult for the Council for Child Protection, but there is someone
who has signed a letter that the Germans include Erica van Beek at the Martha
Foundation in Alphen aan de Rijn. The
Martha Foundation appears to be ‘started’ in Alphen by the Germans! In
Nieuwersluis some of the children were housed.
On a cold,
wet, dark day in December 1943 is Erica then "safely drilled ' in the
Martha Foundation, where she will remain until she was nineteen.
And Hilda?
Hilda with
her two older children can safely get away from Vienna. She gets the chance to go to England. But she
prefers to let her children go - with a girlfriend - she continue to stay in
Amsterdam.
After the war
she married Louis, after a divorce from Erica’s father. The baby from the beginning
of this story thrives on and has a father and a mother. A second baby, born
during the war, does not survive. Hilda with her child also sat for a while in
Westrbork but knew how to survive.
After 1945
she performs a short struggle with the Jewish Refugee Committee and the OPK,
the War Foster Children Committee, to regain her older children. She may have
tried to get Erica out of the orphanage. That did not work. And failure is
–possibly - based on the fact that she is Erica’s aunt and her stepmother.
Well, the OPK did their own standards and Hilda would have not have coped with
the possibility of raising four children.
Has Hilda
been happy with her memories and her past?
122
Vienna
It must not
have been easy living in Vienna between 1920 and 1933. There was the recession,
unemployment, poverty. There, as well as here. Grandfather, Armin Bock, refugee
from the Czech Republic, had become stateless. Married to the Viennese Joszefa
Karpfen (omama, my grandmother), his two children, daughters Olga and Hilda,
are also stateless. Although Jewish, there is no indication that they were part
of the Jewish community in Vienna. But Grandpapa had, due to the persecution of
Jews fled to the Czech Republic. What did he do for a living? Had he (right)
support when unemployed? Or did the family in the beginning a little capital?
Grandpapa
apparently died young. The family was a
member of the Socialist Workers Party. Especially omama seems to have been
militant in it. The youngest daughter, my mother Olga, was also an enthusiastic
member of the Arbeiter Turn Verein and even later won gold at the Workers'
Olympiad in Budapest.
The single
parent family seems to have been very needy. Reasons why Olga took the decision
to try to find a job in the Netherlands. She came to the Netherlands and found,
except for work and income, a man and later had a child from that marriage.
The eldest
daughter had two children in Vienna. From a relationship with a man she could
not marry?
The story is
complicated.
Hitler's hell
is visible in 1933. In that year, in October, Olga married in Netherlands Jaap
van Beek, not a jew, but a blonde blue-eyed Dutchman. (A few generations back,
one Lady Von Dalmann of German landed gentry, married to a Van Beek, so the
"Aryan" could not be doubted.)
Almost two
years later, from the marriage of Olga and Jaap, a daughter is born, Erica. The
marriage seems to have lasted for a half a year longer. Olga goes back to
Vienna with her baby. It is not known whether Hilda is (still) financially
maintained, nor is it known whether, as the separation between Olga and Jaap is
final, Olga receives alimony. It can be assumed that Olga earns a living for
the family. At that time, Erica is so ill that she is hospitalized in the
children's hospital in Vienna and has a lot of children’s sicknesses
consecutively. Which cannot have been conducive to Olga to keep her job.
After
Kristallnacht not only hell breaks loose in Germany, but the panic among Jewish
citizens in surrounding countries.
Jaap since August
1938 separated from Olga, goes to Vienna and begs Olga remarry him for her and
Erica’s safety. Olga refuses and points out to him that Hilda and her two
children are much more vulnerable. How is Jaap committed to marry Hilda and her
two children for their safety while he still loves Olga? Olga is a strong
personality, an athlete at heart, much stronger than Jaap and Hilda together.
Olga goes
with Erica and Omama 'on vacation' and when they come back, Jaap, Hilda and the
two children have left Vienna. That must have happened in the summer of 1939.
Aunt Olly
Weiss
As said Olga
was a member of the Arbeiters Turn Verein. In the same building where she lived
with her family, also the Weiss family lived. And the family loved the little
children of Hilda, especially the eldest daughter Inge. Olly Weiss was Olga’s
team mate.
Olly sought
and found work as a housekeeper or maid in London. She also wanted her parents
to come and Hilda with her two children. She was lucky to find one Miss Palmer,
a wealthy lady who wanted to guarantee both the family Weiss and Hilda. This
event took place in the course of 1938. In '39 all was arranged.
But when push
came to shove, in other words, when Olly went to Vienna to pick them up, Hilda
now turned out to be married to Jaap. Rather than be a maid in England and take
care of her children, she went to Amsterdam with Jaap. While her children, with
a 'children's transport' travelled to London. After being there for ten months,
Inge went to live with the Weiss family,
where, after the death of Olly’s parents was raised by Olly herself. Her
brother Kurti was raised up by foster parents. Both children remained in
England, becoming adults and received British citizenship.
124
Hilda’s third
child, Ilse who was born in the
Netherlands, stayed with her. It was after the war, so she got a (step) father,
grew up prosperously , but not without trauma as the second generation child.
And was actually an only child.
The war also
seems to have been for her parents an indigestible matter and when the daughter
was mature they decided to separate. Not long after that Hilda died, she was
burned out.
13 December
1992
I am sitting
with my feelings back in the war times. For a few days now. Has nothing changed
in fifty years? The realization that the Platform, so Nieuwengein then , now
refuses to do something about the misery of the displaced-shelters in the form
of some distraction, or to advise B & W on a contribution per capita for
Bosnia ( where a hunger winter of '44
is on the way!) and Somalia .... Here
nothing can be done, knowing how it is makes me so desperate that I cannot
sleep and can think of nothing else all day. Although yesterday I have been at
the stand of Novib at the voluntary market all day with a friendly face.
You know, you
can only talk to people who know what you're talking about.
I am glad
that the action against xenophobia, against illegal smear campaign, comes in
order. Peter has created posters for the twenty-fourth. Women for Peace and
Amnesty participate.
125
So I can channel
my grief and my anger without damaging myself.
Sadness and
anger are not gone, oh no.
I want to go
back to December 9, the letters.
I will tell
Rabbi Schachter the story briefly, why I am so determined to straighten out the
Pages. Does he not see it himself, that it is not a remembrance of my mother,
but the desire of my niece to have the name of her family member in this?
N'importe
what kind of data? Not one syllable of it was correct, except the name. My
first feeling was therefore, that the Rabbi, felt a little passed over ,
because I did not respond to the discovery of the niece, who also knew nothing.
But that is not what I was looking for, I must make it clear. Reparation for
Olga, of whose life and death only Hilda knew about and who kept silent from
me. That mantle of fifty years that was revealed by Olly, with instructions
never to let Ilse and Inge know. I want that also in the Pages. I will have to
let Ilse know of that letter. How? I'll have to think, well that's no rush.
Other things
remind Olly that she no longer can place. But concerned about that time, she is
still, though she says that she does not have any "fight" more with
her 85 years.
That means
that she had in that in the past, and that shows. The courage not only for
herself but also for others to find a safe haven, speaks from her letters. It
is a pity, a great pity that Inge and Kurti that I should have known so well in
Vienna have disappeared completely from sight. Actually just like Ilse. A
family band will I never have with them again, but it's nice that I have heard
about them again.
Over the
acceptance of ‘that coat ‘I am still not there, even if I put it in
perspective. How do you do that as a victim? I can say, Hilda, I forgive you;
the fact itself is your underestimation of the danger of your carelessness.
That is something that happens.
126
But it did
have my mother killed, as you ought to have been wearing that coat. And as you
have survived (but how?), so she could
have survived. She would have taken Ilse , combative as she was. Now my
life has given Ilse a home, but apparently not a happy childhood. Let me hold
on to that. Ilse has also become a war victim, her "home." And my
life has consisted of flights from nowhere to nowhere, me closing my past until
now. Here only I have found my home. Only after three children and two
marriages. My oldest lost through drugs and suicide-no mother who could reach
him, he was imprisoned in himself.
Jacob, my
child that hid under a coat until he suffocated. From a fear of living.
Leo, who is
alone and that maybe will remain that way, grew up with me and two fathers
could not be real fathers.
Jessica, who
is still fighting for freedom under that coat, which she now knows, exists.
I myself,
that I no longer dare to venture into a new relationship, after making wrong
choices five times. Thanks for the one who taught me to sublimate my anger and
grief into action for people, who like me suffered from oppression and
infringements of his human dignity, proclaiming rights for the incapacitated!
Is that the
key to my whole life after Olga? Oppression and disregard for my human dignity?
Finally, I was Jewish and, as such, was I- treated in the time when I lived. I
see now. And I have acted in the past twelve years, but for recognition of my
person and to restore my dignity
From my
empathy with those, and for those that I I worked with, from what I have
experienced myself.
But also of
anger and sadness, which could not be captured in words, because I kept the
cargo from the past denied until now.
127
15 December
1992
What is -and
what is the function of -a prophet?
Pastor Mook called me, ‘The prophetess of
Nieuwegein. ‘ That has lingered.
Tonight
council meeting . In the break I was talking to J.H. He told me
enthusiastically about the worries of preparing for Christmas. And I told him
that I was not able to celebrate Christmas this year. What happens so close
east of our borders. With Bosnia and images of Somalia.
Another
councilor said later, "You did not come to make us sad, huh Erica?”
What should I
do? Stay talking in the form of politeness? I may not express my feelings, my
sorrow and anger and impotence in order not to disrupt the Christmas party? May
I not indicate that we cannot celebrate with a clear conscience and cheerful
mood while such terrible inhuman things happen this Christmas season?
Did Reverend
Mook mean that I am a thistle under foot? Or (calamity) prophet who disturbs
the peace of the conscience of Christians and non Christians?
We, war children and adults know, yet have still
all experienced at firsthand? And yet are still scared, angry, helpless and
almost powerless? Almost, because only a small area, we cannot get involved to
resist the immense indifference, the ‘cocoon’. Pull that screen, that wall
you've built around you and just see what happens around us. Let's work
together to try there to change that. It is not for us, then for our children
and grandchildren. So that the blood on our hands of our indifference does not
come upon our descendants. Then we will be certainly guilty. Omama, as weak as
you were, you were a militant woman who meant a lot for the labor movement.
Mutti, the
strength of your character, your perseverance and sportsmanship, your living
will to start a new life here, with all the menace of Hitler Germany. Give me
some of your perseverance, despite all resistance. I'm so discouraged now.
128.
Who wants to
hear
Those who
wish to see
Who suffers
too
Not just with
me
But with the
horror
Where people
like them
Should survive them
or die?
I did not ask
for, nor can I shut myself away from it.
My
powerlessness over my past blends seamlessly into despair about the horrors of
today.
I thought I
could get away now, but every time that it takes longer, I am more a part of
them. I hear them, right here in my safe little flat I'm not safe there.
L’histoire interieure se repete toujours; comme l'exterieur. Et parce que cette
histoire d'aujourd'hui est l'exterior. Et parce que cette histoire
d'aujourd'hui est l'histoire de moi-meme et de Maman et Omaman et six miliones
des autres hommes. Et il passe aujourd'hui, après cinquantes années.
Now back in
French, earlier to Olly in German. What comes up as I write this?
Say, write
what I know, what I feel. And make people participants of what happens ,
whether they like it or not.
The coat has
to go.
I fight and
wrestle with all these feelings, day and night. Sometimes it's sadness so great
that I have no spoken words, and if I find them, because of the interests of
others, my mouth takes over, without being able to stop it.
Is this the
function of a prophet?
Or do I behave like an intrusive campaigner?
No, that is
not me. But maybe they see me like that, if I do not keep my feelings under
control and thus contact others in their heart and conscience.
I do this
more than ten years-over declared unfit for work (sick and disabled), over
racism versus equality. If it would leave me indifferent, I would have no need
to write about it or talk about it. Sometimes they give me the feeling that
they think I am mad.
So be it.
This is me, Erica, made up of a life that was dominated by an invisible and
unknown coat of fifty years now. Exponent of "lest we forget."
129.
16 December
1992
I just read
Ilse’s letter of 14 November again, where she tries to untangle the knot that
has occured upon completion of Rivka’s addition to The Page. The history of Olga and Hilda were
jumbled. This could imply that Hilda has also told Rivka facts - the jacket-
and Rivka has therefore become confused,
that is the misunderstanding . I try now
to put it in the time. Everyone was still busy processing, or stopping of the
flaring memories of the horrors. We were traumatized, and could not put into
words what kept us so busy. Maybe Hilda has told her story confusingly, which
was picked up as such. But when she wrote a letter about it, not only Olly knew
it, but Rivka knew then - and Ilse also now!
1.How do I
tell Ilse?
2.How can I
tell that to Aunt Olly?
Oh time, get
me in that matter!
Kalien
Blonden called. Relief: the radio programme is off. The editors did not think
it a good opportunity.
I let on to
her surprise that I find it fine,because
the only reason I had agreed, lay in the search for survivors, who would have
known her. That is now no longer necessary. Thence.
130.
130.
The last data
is now coming in and the next week I hope, if not the real grieving process,
yet will I finish this book.
In the last
few days, there were quite a few things that ran together, so it was difficult
to stay with this case. So emotional, I could not sleep and really collapsed
yesterday. (And promptly at half past three in the afternoon I slept until
eight o'clock this morning, with some interruptions!)
Why my
emotions with me went on the run?
Among other
things because I cannot handle that people very carelessly spend millions and millions on Christmas shopping,
chunky tables, feasting, while just over our border and further, into former
Yugoslavia, history is being repeated. The same history, which I'm trying to
deal with in this book. Shut up, Erica, don’t make us sad, and do not appeal to
us and our consciences. Don’t you see that we want to celebrate, you disturber!
Judging by
the signals I expected Thursday, December 24th not a big turnout for the torch
vigil, we organized as AFKIN.
Yesterday I again
brought out in the library, the Jewish Weekly News. Searching for clues that
maybe I had previously overlooked. In the Jewish Weekly News, number 20 of
August 21, 1942, I found an article on the confirmation of the star.
131.
Serious warning
The presidents
of Amsterdam’s Jewish Council make further emphasis for Amsterdam's attention
to the obligation of Jews to:
1st to
properly attach the Star of David and wear it visibly;
2nd refrain
from entering gardens, parks and all the roads that are forbidden for Jews;
3rd not use
traffic ways without a license;
4th not live
or stay at other addresses than the above address mentioned on the identity
card.
Violation of
these provisions has led in several cases to severe punishment, even when it
was solely due to carelessness. Hence the repeated serious warning.
It is conceivable that Hilda has even tried to
get help from the Jewish Council, or at least tried to get to the Council for
information when Olga was not coming home. Maybe she told them that Olga was
wearing her coat. But nothing helped. This remains hypotheses, but I cannot
imagine differently.
21 December
1992
Today I
received this letter from the RIOD:
Dear Mrs van
Beek,
In response
to your letter of 2 December 1992, I can tell you the following:
The
collections of the RIOD contain unfortunately no more details about your mother
Olga Bock then you are already familiar with. For example, there are no
documents that have been preserved, which relate to the arrest of your mother.
132
THE JAILS
ADMINISTRATION HAS NOT BEEN RECOVERED
AFTER THE WAR*
Of the
documents relating to the Westerbork transit camp, the proof is that Olga Bock
was indeed deported on 11 September 1942.
I would have
liked to have done more for you. I'm sorry, that by the limitedness of the
material at my disposal, it is not possible.
Sincerely, Ms
A van Boxmeer.
Where can I
still go with my anger and sadness? Is there a policeman ever punished for the
preparation of murdering my innocent mother? A driver for obediently bringing
her to her place of execution?
And today
happens again the same! Are people because of their origin, their religion,
massively persecuted their appearance, killed, expelled, put to flight. And
survivors should only see them ready to come out.
Okay, okay,
it's all happened fifty years ago and I am only now so far, I can handle it a
little, to relive that time for myself.
Yet it is too
much for me, as before, the same things are happening. My empathy should not be
stretched too far!
All and
sundry of the Dutch tribe celebrates rather extensive Christmas. So I
don’t need to .
*Capitals are
mine
133
23 December
1992
It brought to
mind again the note of Olga. There is no trace of reproach to Hilda . Instead,
she tries yet to speak to Hilda with courage, "Kopf hoch, Madel."
History does
not change its view. Never has there been a ‘point of return’. Who am I, that I
look back with so much anger and resentment at a time, which cannot be compared
with this time, in this society, in this same country? And, I have the examples that today terrible things happen
with and through people.
May a man
fail? Weak and maybe a coward, if he should suffer such intolerable tension, as
at that time? With, still, the examples of Germany and now in Yugoslavia.
130.
The last data
is now coming in and the next week I hope, if not the real grieving process,
yet will I finish this book.
In the last
few days, there were quite a few things that ran together, so it was difficult
to stay with this case. So emotional, I could not sleep and really collapsed
yesterday. (And promptly at half past three in the afternoon I slept until
eight o'clock this morning, with some interruptions!)
Why my
emotions with me went on the run?
Among other
things because I cannot handle that people very carelessly spend millions and millions on Christmas shopping,
chunky tables, feasting, while just over our border and further, into former
Yugoslavia, history is being repeated. The same history, which I'm trying to
deal with in this book. Shut up, Erica, don’t make us sad, and do not appeal to
us and our consciences. Don’t you see that we want to celebrate, you disturber!
Judging by
the signals I expected Thursday, December 24th not a big turnout for the torch
vigil, we organized as AFKIN.
Yesterday I
again brought out in the library, the Jewish Weekly News. Searching for clues
that maybe I had previously overlooked. In the Jewish Weekly News, number 20 of
August 21, 1942, I found an article on the confirmation of the star.
131.
Serious warning
The
presidents of Amsterdam’s Jewish Council make further emphasis for Amsterdam's
attention to the obligation of Jews to:
1st to
properly attach the Star of David and wear it visibly;
2nd refrain
from entering gardens, parks and all the roads that are forbidden for Jews;
3rd not use
traffic ways without a license;
4th not live
or stay at other addresses than the above address mentioned on the identity
card.
Violation of
these provisions has led in several cases to severe punishment, even when it
was solely due to carelessness. Hence the repeated serious warning.
It is conceivable that Hilda has even tried to
get help from the Jewish Council, or at least tried to get to the Council for
information when Olga was not coming home. Maybe she told them that Olga was
wearing her coat. But nothing helped. This remains hypotheses, but I cannot
imagine differently.
21 December
1992
Today I
received this letter from the RIOD:
Dear Mrs van
Beek,
In response
to your letter of 2 December 1992, I can tell you the following:
The
collections of the RIOD contain unfortunately no more details about your mother
Olga Bock then you are already familiar with. For example, there are no
documents that have been preserved, which relate to the arrest of your mother.
132
THE JAILS
ADMINISTRATION HAS NOT BEEN RECOVERED
AFTER THE WAR*
Of the
documents relating to the Westerbork transit camp, the proof is that Olga Bock
was indeed deported on 11 September 1942.
I would have
liked to have done more for you. I'm sorry, that by the limitedness of the
material at my disposal, it is not possible.
Sincerely, Ms
A van Boxmeer.
Where can I
still go with my anger and sadness? Is there a policeman ever punished for the
preparation of murdering my innocent mother? A driver for obediently bringing
her to her place of execution?
And today
happens again the same! Are people because of their origin, their religion,
massively persecuted their appearance, killed, expelled, put to flight. And
survivors should only see them ready to come out.
Okay, okay,
it's all happened fifty years ago and I am only now so far, I can handle it a
little, to relive that time for myself.
Yet it is too
much for me, as before, the same things are happening. My empathy should not be
stretched too far!
All and
sundry of the Dutch tribe celebrates rather extensive Christmas. So I
don’t need to .
*Capitals are
mine
133
23 December
1992
It brought to
mind again the note of Olga. There is no trace of reproach to Hilda. Instead,
she tries to speak to Hilda with courage, "Kopf hoch, Madel."
History does
not change itself. Never has there been a point of return. “Who am I that I
look back with so much anger and resentment at a time, which cannot be compared
with this time, in this society, in this same country? And, I see through
examples today that terrible things happen with and through people.
May a man
fail? Weak and maybe a coward if he should suffer such intolerable tension, as
at that time? With, still, the examples of Yugoslavia and now in Germany?
Hilda,
Whatever have
been the consequences of the 'coat', who am I, that I would condemn. If I have
to forgive anything, I do hereby wholeheartedly!
It apparently
had .
And if
not, then we have to accept that life is as it is and I am that I am. Do not
look back at what might have been if ....
And I want to
see in advance what is possible. What good things I can still contribute. So
what happened and what is presently happening east of our borders, will perhaps
not go repeating itself...
Over that and
this way I will have to write back to Olly and Ilse.
And I will.
I have
searched for my mother and found her. Even though I did not know how I would
find her, I knew that I had never taken leave of her. I did that now. And I may
mourn a youth that I and hundreds of thousands, even millions of children that
were taken away by the madness of power forces, who use the power they have to
create people that are immersed in grief, because they differ in color and
origin from what they propose as normal.
134
This is the
letter I wrote to Rabbi Schachter:
22 December
1992
Dear Rabbi
Schachter,
It took me a
few days before I was able to write back.
I would first
like to thank you again for your concern of my wellbeing.
Enclosed you
will find the new Page of my mother with a picture of her and me as a child.
Thank you that you want to take care of her file.
I want to
tell you again, so that no misunderstanding exists, I had to research the past
of my mother and me. I had no evidence that she ever existed, except this
picture and some papers, when in a short time two things happened. The book of
Elma Verhey "To the Jewish Child” was released and the conference “The
Hiding Child “, became public. I not only survived almost without memories, but
also with fear and anger that I did not understand.
I had to make
this quest. Not only for me but also for my daughter Jessica, a
second-generation child, so she and her mother will understand themselves
better and also to give her a past.
I've told you
about my two sons, one of them died by suicide, by deliberately taking an
overdose of pills and drugs. That has to do with my past. And the second son
has his difficulties through that.
And there was
another, important reason and that was to give a grave with her own name to my
mother. So she was no longer an unknown and unnamed victim.
135
I never
sought nor wanted relatives. Anyone who has survived, that knew of my
existence, never let that be known. Not even shown of their existence. I say
this not with anger or self-pity. But there is no room for them. I have my own
life, my (former) family, my friends and my work. With the latter I mean, I
(still) want to believe in the 'Global Village' and our shared responsibility
there-for. So I see my daily volunteer work. Here I have found my family and
friends. Believe me, I have no bitterness.
I found my mother. And my own past.
At the same
time I have lost my fear of my memories. And thus so many remembrances have
come back. Not all, the most traumatic still remain hidden.
I have among
other things discovered that my mother was arrested and thrown in prison and
later via Wester Bork in Auschwitz is murdered, that the coat she was wearing
at the time, with the pinned-star, was the coat of her sister. She probably
borrowed it to get something quickly for her sister’s baby. .and did not
return. And sister survived and has not looked back at me.
That makes
this discovery very difficult to process. Do you understand?
The whole
story of my quest, now by friend Paul typed and edited. I will keep my promise
and send you a copy. That is if the book is finished. If it is published.
A miserable
side effect is that this quest is taking place at a time when all that misery
in Germany and the former Yugoslavia is now happening. Where the Serbs are
doing the same things against non-Serbs, especially against Muslims. It is very
frightening to believe that humanity will never change, no matter how big the
technical progress and the communication possibilities for humanity nowadays
have become. On the contrary, it seems that we just want to use it to destroy
ourselves and the world. There was a time, not so long ago; I had the idea that
humanity was becoming better and wiser.
Well, I'm
wiser ... and sadder.
136
Regarding my
Israel I had the hope that the war with the Palestinians would come to an end
with election of the Labour Party. But there is still no sign of peace. On the
contrary, the PLO and Hamas will work together and I'm terrified for such
cooperation.
Judaism and
Peace.... will it ever go together?
Last I read
in a newspaper a statement by a Serbian word carrier: "War makes sense as
long as there is a possibility to make a profit." Is that not cynical? Put
the word 'peace' in place of 'war' and we can have the most delicious world.
And then of course an all-out ban and
closing of all weapons factories because
they destroy our world and kill our children, our fathers and mothers.
But these are
simply philosophical thoughts of mine. I expect no one, to make this a reality.
I'm going to
leave you. Thanks for everything you've done for me. Receive my best wishes for
yourself. Forever,
Yours
sincerely,
Your Erica
van Beek.
37
24 December
1992
A while ago I
wrote: "In the past is the present, in the moment what is coming." A
cliché, but how true!
The hatred is
now grown by supra-nationalism and social discontent is the seed where fertile
soil is found in the victims of today and future generations. The raped women
of Bosnia bring forth children who are already hated for their birth.
The fruits
thereof may be new wars again, in about 25, 50 or 100 years.
Tribal strife,
religious wars, they are now and always will be. Because we are only human,
obstinate and unruly.
And all
surviving victims will be able to write books like this ...
Peace on
earth is a dream, we have to face the truth.
Maybe that is
the lesson I had to learn and if necessary why I had to write this book.
The
"Global Village," which I dream of is the dream of a relatively small
group of people. With little power. And our world will continue to run maybe a
little longer. But will they survive?
To believe in
it, I would have to rely on the fundamental goodness of people. The fundamental
sense of responsibility for each other as human beings. The I = you feeling.
And I must
begin with myself.
Sigh..... I'm
not there yet.
39
Jood
141
January 29,
1993
Finally I
have written draft letters to Olly and Ilse. Maybe I can finish them Sunday and
send them. The text I want in any case to record here.
Dear aunt
Olly,
It took me a
long time to learn to live with what is written in your last letter. The
thought that Olga had the coat on of Hilda was very hard to bear. It is even
reflected in the title of the book about my childhood, that will be called Two
women and a coat.
Now the time
is ripe, now I am able to live with it, as with everything that has happened.
The period
from 1939 to May 1945 was on the Continent a time of incomprehensible terrible
events. Where the people who survived were injured for the rest of their lives.
Hilda was also briefly in the
concentration camp Westerbork, together with Ilse who was a baby.
I am
convinced that Hilda has gone to the Jewish Council in Amsterdam when Olga did
not return. And she told them what has happened. I am so confident because I
read in the Jewish Weekly from a few weeks later an article warning people
extra not to pin the star, but to sew it on: "Several people that are
pinning have been severely punished.” What I would have to forgive Hilda of, I
have forgiven her.
142
As you said,
life has not exactly been kind to me, but Hilda had to live with her grief and
her anger, and get on with her life. What's maybe never really happened, to
which maybe she was not able to.
I tell you
(including myself) once again: life is as it is. I've learned to accept that.
It is
possible that Olga on that (rainy!) day in August '42 put on Hilda’s jacket
just to get something quickly for the baby, and she was arrested (and taken to
jail and later to Westerbork etc.) almost as soon as she came out on the streets. Her face was so
truly Jewish, that I doubt that, even if for her a hiding place was available,
that she might have survived.
Therefore, I
cannot understand how Ilse, Inge and Kurti could know nothing about it, even
after Hilda and Louis died. It was still not intentional Hilda; it was
carelessness, with incalculable consequences.
I have
decided to send a copy of your letter to Ilse. Maybe that's a consolation to
her. She is still with sadness and anger from the past. There were so many, too
many things that she could not understand. So much that she was unable to go to
the conference Hidden Children.
Can you
imagine what war does with small children? Even those events that you cannot
understand, that feeling of "I could have better not have been born,"
which remains always. That entire trauma, your whole life. Until you have learned
to find words for and to use those words for yourself. This is done usually not
before your fiftieth birthday. And then the past, has long since used or deformed your character. And your
life decides. The fears and anger have become a part of you. How do you deal
with that? That is for an outsider very difficult to understand.
Life has also
not been easy for you, I suppose. But you, your family and the children were
not hunted in England as wild animals such as Jewish people in the Netherlands.
You were pretty safe there.
Do you
understand, there is no more reproach. To anyone. It all happened. As it is
happening in Yugoslavia. We never expected that it could all happen again. But
it does!
143
Dear aunt
Olly,
I have now
also been able to give my mother a funeral. In Jerusalem, at Yad Vashem in the
Hall of Names. And my whole childhood became memories to me.
That was the
purpose of the quest and no less for my life that now has to continue, more
than ever. The whole has to be a book that is worth reading.
I send you my
love and greetings and thank you for your help.
Hoping again
to receive a letter from you,
Your Erica.
Dear Ilse,
It has taken
a long time before I could process what I came to know about the past. Like so
many Jewish people, I have processed it- with a friend in this case in a book,
which will hopefully be released.
It is much, very much, that has become clear.
Also regarding aunt Olly’s feelings towards your mother. Do you want me to tell
you everything or would you rather just read my last letter to Aunt Olly? You
can also wait for the book. The title is Two women and a jacket.
Only
now am I able to discuss with you anything you want to know. Your sadness and
anger have become clearer to me. As for me, I have now learned to accept life and
let go of the past now that I have found words to describe it. That is also
thanks to you.
We cannot
change the past.
144
I'm now
finished with it all. And I hope you find the courage to do so too. Maybe my
letter to Olly will help you with that. Otherwise I will let you know when the
book comes out.
Do not
hesitate to write me, call or visit, if you have questions to ask. I have now a
different perspective than 'then'.
I hear from
you?
Yours Erica
These letters
I now send as soon as possible.
145
February
146
147
28 February
1993
Letter
received from Aunt Olly, which made me very distressed. Of course she's right.
But Elma and Paul found it too: Now I turn and I should be able to let it
sink a while.
Here's the
letter.
Dear Erica,
This time, I
find it hard to answer your letter. But first, I wish you luck with your book.
I had no idea you were a writer. But you have abused my trust. When I told you
about that incident with Hilda’s jacket I prompted you not to tell Ilse.
Finally, it was her mother's fault that may have led to Olga’s death, even if
it was indirect. Now it is in your book and Ilse will read it and she could
tell Inge. You cannot tell me that it was necessary to make their memory of
their mother worse.
I can only
hope that Ilse will not be too much affected.
Maybe it can
be prevented that Inge will know. She has enough to worry about with her
husband's illness. In any case, I do not think Inge suffers from her memories
of that time, because she and I only know of the events through other people.
Our only concerns were the war cases, we Jewish people, even strangers, were
treated the same as the English themselves.
I only hope
that now you are able to put the past behind you.
Best wishes,
Aunt Olly
148
Of course her
trust is, in terms of the jacket, ashamed. But how do I make it clear that I
did not just think that was precisely the point where everything revolved
around? For fifty years, my mother is dead in silence out of shame about it. Is
it not time that it is written, spoken and processed? Out of concern for them,
the now adult children of Hilda, I may panic again, keep my mouth shut, I feel
guilty for events in which I have had some part. I became the victim, not her.
Apparently
she was so angry (or confused) that she could not place the name on the
envelope accurately.
149
March
151
12 March 1993
Visit to
Westerbork. Search for Barak 41.0.
At five past
eight Jessica and I met at station Batau-north in Nieuwegein. The train to
Amersfoort at 8:44 we reached easily and we got there at just after nine. A
terrible station. With that in Apeldoorn, I think, one of the worst of the
Netherlands. A type of aircraft thoroughfare that comes out in Amersfoort-Never
land. It took a while before we could orientate and we even had to ask the way
to the Amersfoort station, where we should wait for Dorine to ride together in
her car to Westerbork.
The weather
gods had the first day of spring and made that the trip became an almost
festive experience. Despite the gray tones that marked the destination.
Just before
Hooghalen we decided to eat coffee with a treat. But it was only to get a
sandwich on stale bread.
The parking
lot of the Remembrance Centre in Westerbork lay still in the early afternoon.
And when we got out the full gravity of our goal fell like a gray blanket over
us.
Inside, in
the open lobby with visitor reception, the almost sacred atmosphere was
shattered by a whining barking dog. Moments later, the sound of Christmas songs
....nota bene, belong to a video film further on.
The
exhibition is almost complete. Only my mother was, also here, not to be found
in any picture, in any film. She was here as well? All the daily and weekly
horrors. More than sixty thousand people, including Olga my mother lived here
for a longer or shorter time before they were transported for slaughter in
cattle trucks.
152
It's all
displayed there, with matching sounds. Only missing the smell of fear.
At the end of
the exhibition, I was surprised by the fragment of a poem by Leo Vroman:
Come this
evening with stories
How the war
is gone...
And they
repeat a thousand times
All the times
I will weep
That was too
much. Internally I was at that time a lost, screaming and frantic child
appearing as usual, I think. Very controlled. Jessica and Dorine were not done
yet. But I could no longer see clearly.
Later,
outside, the worst point of pressure of the boiler could be taken. Through an
emotional spot, tears: "That poem of Vroman that they should have left
out...." Nonsense, of course. It hung there not for me. But it was the straw
that broke the camel’s back.
Walking
through the forest of the Observatory we tried to reach the Memorial Field ,
the former camp. I was actually secretly glad that we were a bit lost. The
final over tired body did during that seemingly endless walk make my emotions
fly away. At one point I heard and saw again and I could hear birds enjoy a day
out in the first warm rays of the year.
We reached a
crossroads. Where was the Memorial Field? Left? Right?
We decided to
go left.Mistake. An endless road without any traffic. Until finally a boy
approached with a transport container behind his bike and revealed to us the
secret of this traffic-free road.
Dorine had
wanted to pick up the car in order to go to the
Memorial Field . But here, on the site of the Observatory , whereby this
road also belongs cars may not drive. Because it causes interference in the
reception of space signals. Later we would be on the field, and perceive for
ourselves the enormous steadily rotating satellite dishes.
153
There was nothing
to do but continue to walk back and by the Memorial Centre , step on the bus to
the field. A bit of a bad feeling for me, because I was at the first
confrontation with the bus chauffeur several hours before quite emotional about
the sign on the front of the bus 'Kamp
Westerbork' in large letters. Did that now may not be: former Kamp Westerbork?
Or Memorial Field Westerbork? He responded quite shocked, he had never thought
about it. The driver was a nice guy who even picked us up again.
And the sun
kept its profusion spreading above us.
The Memorial
Field is only recognizable as ‘Camp
Westerbrok’ through the eyes of the mind. That means that on this radiant day,
close your eyes and try to imagine that every slight rise in the ground was a
barracks or a house, the roads were muddy pools, the air was cold and menacing.
And where there now is a floor in the area, the locomotive was with cattle cars
behind it. Dark, wet, cold. Screaming, crying, fear of death. Animal apathy
too. Human survival instinct in all shapes, smells of fear, impoverishment and
damp peat.... But also superhuman courage and optimism against their better
judgment.
We searched for Barrack No. 41-0, where
my mother had stayed, but there was not
before every barrack a mushroom with a
number. We dwelt at length on the former apple instead. For every Jew an
asterisk for each Shinti or Roma (Gypsy is still a nickname) a fire. An English
boy picked up a loose star to take it as a souvenir. "You shouldnt do
that," I said and he obediently put the star back on a stone. For how
long?
Walking along the ancient monument of the bent
rails, along the paths and fences, along the partially intact kept ruins of
barracks, my courage sank in shoes. Would I find the place where- about -Olga
had been? Along the way I picked up a piece of debris on gray cement with
pebbles from the side of the road. Something from the bottom, the base of the
former barracks. It has been given a place with just such a piece of debris
from Auschwitz, at home in a ceramic pot.
Then, with
the exit in sight and already standing bus, Jessica screamed. ‘Forty-one!! '
Dorine and I reacted sluggishly, for we had not expected it. ‘Ma, Dorine,
please look: Barak 41.’
From a huge
sense of relief that there was yet again a proof of her existence, I looked at
Jessica and Dorine to the mushroom which indicated that this was a house in a
long line. Did it mean that she ended up with friends or acquaintances? The
panic, which she must have known during the three days she was here? Immediately
afterwards I realized that I'm here, as her daughter and standing with her
granddaughter and my good friend, after fifty years, to bring her a final
tribute. As at a funeral. This is where I spent my last salute. That is so
Erica That I had to grin in spite of myself. My dead loved ones live in my
heart that was never tied to one place. But the relief to have laid the last
piece of the puzzle in place, having finished the quest, was great. I kept
grinning. Jessica was delighted that it was she who found the place, Dorine was
happy for me.
The purpose
of the journey was found. And in the van to the center I told elated to the
astonishment of the other occupants, ‘I have found again the place of my
mother’
The return
trip to the West was quick. And the thread to the past snapped when we were
tired and hungry and could find no place to recuperate, to get something before
we had to take the long journey home. Dorine decided to drive to Amsterdam. She
put Jessica and myself out at staion Amersfoort. Her children were too long
waiting for her, it was getting late.
My daughter
and I decided to first eat in ’The Old Tram 'opposite the station.
155
The waiter
was a friendly young flatter . The food was not even reasonable. Then he asked
in clearing if it had tasted, I could not help saying that the meat had been
too long in the fat, because the steak did
not taste good.
The train was
ready. Only in Hilversum, we discovered that we had taken the wrong train.
157
September 2,
1994
To create a
book, that was actually not what it was about. When the need was there, Erica
wanted to force in herself a breakthrough. Writing was just a tool. Has it done
her good?
"I can
now talk about myself, not as before , then you had to bring everything
out," Erica said. And I think:
Yes
You are now
Different
yet
the same
Paul
Twee vrouwen
en een jas
Dedicated
to the
Jewish social work ,
Dorine de
Gruyter,
in memory of
Olga, my
mother
And with
thanks to Paul Groenendaal and to Elma Verhey,
without whom this book would not have come
about
Foreword
On the 1st
September 1992
Erica writes
hesitantly in a nice small, silk-bound booklet, "was very cozy ..."
and she ponders further on the title of the diary that she wants to track the
reporting of the quest which it has decided.
The reason is
threefold
An inner need
which has become increasingly stronger in recent years.
All the chaos of her childhood surfaced.
she sits at
her kitchen table looking out over the gallery railing over Nieuwegein. In this
house she lives satisfied. Now is time to dare.
And she
begins to write and muses. The title….
They could
not have suspected in the summer of 1994, at the same kitchen table but much
happier, with a sigh of relief and glad to work on her book with friends, the
manuscript would shut and satisfyingly say, "Right, now we can eat. I have
a beetroot salad. Jewish recipe. Do you
like it? "
They would
certainly not have suspected two years ago, that her book would be in the shop
windows in 1994.
Yet that is
so. In August 1994 she was eating beetroot salad with two editors. Twice
repeated she had to go through exhausting the entire confrontation with its own
past, word for word, to make a diary into
a book. Popular portions, clarify things that diarists always perceived
as historic.
I was one of
the editors and I can assure you that the whole process from September 1992
until now, two years later was a hellish emotional period for Erica.
Paul Groenendaal
Leiden, 1 september 1994
September
15.
I have made a
decision. I will ask Dorine to help me-finally- to go back to the past.
I have told
that to my friends Piet S. and Corrie van R. Corrie is an old girlfriend that I
know from the anti -racism work and Piet is chairman of the club where I am a
secretary. I have told them that if I continue to function that I will need
their help. That is why you are my friends? Through difficult times to help
each other?
With Corrie I
had a good talk, among other things, the power that comes from daring to
continue to be vulnerable. She is currently in a difficult period and suffering
physically and mentally.
I gave her
calcium and magnesium, herbs and vitamins. In her family I am “the herb lady”
not completely unjustly.
Piet gave me
as an answer a mountain of work that by tomorrow morning had to be done.
for the first
time I realized that my teeth bit together when I heard my own keys rattle
while I opened the door to the deadbolt. Memories of the Martha foundation.
Later that
evening. The memories become clearer.
The leader, Ilsa Love, had the compassionate
habit of using her keys, if she wanted to "admonish" children.
1943
-Nieuwersluis?
We stood in
line one behind the other, naked, with a towel and a washcloth. Forty children.
Two at a time we were washed in a cold bath. Now again I smell the scent of it.
And in the dorms, there were many bed
wetter’s. Beds which were, roughly forty centimeters apart.
16.
Woe betides you if you have not said or sang
well before bed your prayers. God's love also expressed itself as
"they" heard children still whispering : then they made you stand
before your bed, cold feet on the ground, and wait and see how long they let
you stand. Sometimes for hours. And you dared not to go to bed or to say
anything. I was always picked out. If I had not knitted well , I had to knit at
night sitting on the marble stairs. If she was back on time and not pleased,
you got there "seams" in. And sometimes she forgot me. I sat there
half naked, until she had to go to the toilet and just saw me sitting there.
Stopping
blows. Every time going up and down the line. I
could never do it good and flee enough. When it was my turn , it was
time for slaps, until I was half unconscious. What made her even angrier was
that I could not respond. From fear, or also pride?
Then you had
to eat on the penalty bench, the “biekenbank” and you were not allowed to play.
In was proud
of my father , who could get on with her. Who brought so many sweets that all
the children, also those that had visitors could eat sweets too. What was left
over was taken away by Miss Geert Knoet. She searched me to make sure that I
did not hide any. All the children called him Papa and loved him.
Emmie Veldkamp- as snow white so beautiful. Red
cheeks, pitch-black eyes and hair. She sat behind me in school and kept
pricking me in my back with a pin. Finally I had enough; I turned around slowly
and dropped solemnly my ink pot over her head empty.
That day was
I beaten so much with the walking stick of Mr. van de Berg that I had to be
taken to the hospital. The children bullied me so much, because I never said or
did anything back. After the ink pot scene was that over for good. They saw
that I "just" only responded when it suited me. Nevertheless Geert
Knoete still saw me as a good victim, was why?
17.
3 september
1992
The name of Margaret G. Van der H. was
Greetje. She studied with me the Bible sitting in Alphen aan den Rhijn and
comes from the Martha charity. She made contact with me and we made an
appointment. Today at Central station in Den Haag. Neutral territory. We arranged to meet at the
third desk in the hall, at three o'clock and because we did not know each other
she would recognize me by a bright pink umbrella that I was carrying.
My train
arrived at a quarter to three , right on time. And while I stepped off the
platform and walked to the hall, I looked around to see if I could recognize
her. She should be wearing a red jacket. I did not see her so I waited
And as time
passed, the passengers around me were together at the counter and rushed to
their trains and I saw homeless and drug addicts. I became despondent and more
despondent .What could have gone wrong?
After waiting an hour I took the train home.
Money thrown
away, that journey and now I am skint. I can’t travel until I have money again.
Preparations for the municipal platform Global Awareness, where I among others
with Piet work, has so far cost nearly 100 euros on shipments, letters and the
like. It is voluntary work, therefore I have to see if I will get it back, and
if so when.
So I have just called Margaret: It was my
fault that the appointment did not go according to plan. I had Thursday in my
diary and she as teacher could only get Wednesday free. Therefore she waited
for an hour on Wednesday for nothing. We have now an appointment for next
Sunday, 7 September.
Then she
comes to me, not on neutral territory!
She told me,
via telephone, things about the Martha foundation that I did not Know any more.
About farmer Kwakernaak for example whose farm next to the home, whose calves I
could take care of. Oh yes , I still remember
that .
ik doopte de kalfjes zelfs , en voor
de stier , die altijd in zijn hok zat en die vreselijk hard kon loeien, was ik
erg bang.
I baptized
even the calves, and the bull, which was always in his kennel and who could
howl terribly hard, I was very scared of. Margaret told of the shoe maker of the charity , over
the subsequent build-up of the group of children. And I told him about the
injustice that I, because I was allowed to study, was held responsible for the
behavior of the younger children in my group. We talked for a long time , but I
can not visualize her.
There are a
lot of people of my age searching their
past. Rien G. is one of them. I know him only from the telephone. He too
is searching and has stories that for an “normal” man come across as
unreal. Rien is grown up in a Christian family and no one could explain to him
over his (orthodox ) circumcision. He has lived in Alpha aan de Rijn and later
in Boskoop. He remembered groups of children that rode bicycles in the Martha
foundation. I remember the kilometers long marches that we did in lines of
three ,to and through villages around Alphen. Very recognizable as asylum
children ,but bicycling ? I don’t remember that . The only bicycle that I
remember , I got from my father and that was stolen within two weeks! the
leadership will have had fun with that.
Family Cote.
Father was vice president, mother was a woman that every child wanted. We were
children , without parents, without family ,without backgrounds. They were very loved by us girls
that were growing up .I studied with
Mieke their daughter and I still have a photo of her that she is in with other
friends from school.
4 September
1992
Memories. Nieuwersluis. White, Sunday sleeved aprons,
black worsted stockings, clogs. White metal crib and curtains with lots of lace. Was that toys or
did babies lie in them? A very large house ,a park around about with a large
grass field.
19.
Upstairs was
a hall: The toilets flooded over, stink
and filth everywhere. No memories of the layout of the house or the daily
affairs .
Later, after 1946, Alphen aan den
Rijn. The group
where I first sat , was right of the building. That was of the leader (of day of night) Geert Knoet. Later on I sat
above in the group M2… the electric cables hung loose out the wall. I got a
shock and was unconscious for a while.
on a bench in a small alcove in the hall I came around. In the hall of
M2 I learned other children songs and dances. I made a dance from “ zeg
kwezelken wildet gij dansen?” I still
remember that dance and in bed I told
the kids always (horror) stories , where
the others always huddled
together in bed. That could then apparently.
Was it there
that I first got my menstruation? I was eleven years old and no longer in the
group of Geert Knoet. I must have been in panick when I found blood in my bed
in the morning. Scared to get punishment- or that I had a fatal illness.
But the
leader ( I don’t know which one) told me that I was now a Big Girl and no
longer could I play with the boys. She gave me clean sheets and strange-looking
terry "canvases" with a hole on each side and a waist belt. That was
that, that was my sexual information sessions and that of the girls of my
generation.
The school
attic, which stood on the site. What I did there? I was there sometimes for
drawing lessons? There were antique busts and heads of plaster and marble and
it smelled and was very dusty.
Mr. Van Dijk
from the third class sat with his hand in my pants . If I reacted he told me to
“shut up” and pinched me hard.
20.
These are
memories that come up. I don’t remember any of the other leaders except the
sadistic women Geert Knoet and Ida de Liefde
( the corpse if compassion , “so as we called her) she got later an eye
sickness , literally fire red eyes and according to tradition would go blind.
We called that the punishment of God. There were also good leaders , such as
the one Margaret called : Leny Zwaal.
Margreet
found it unlikely that I was made
responsible for twelve young people from my group ....I was studying and was
the only one that had a small room for myself- a former kitchen- where I could
do my homework.
“But” said
the former leader ( who?) “then you should make sure that the youngsters stay
sweet” or words to that effect. That I do not remember names! The result was
that I could not do my homework in the afternoon or evenings. I taught myself
from the clock tower that I could see out my window , to sleep and wake up ,
sometimes at four in the morning to do my homework. I had to be a good example
.Even now is six hours sleep enough! I had to go to bed at the same time as
the others and was controlled if my
light was out.
That ”
privilege “lasted less than a year. Then I had to go back to the “dorm “ and my
room became a kitchen again. At least in my memory.
Slak van
Beek. That was me. That is what they called me. Slow, clumsy, always the last
in the line, whatever line. In the line by Geert Knoet , for every run in the
black stockings or knitting on Sunday gray hosiery. How often did I have to
take my work back and start again? And how often did I get beaten because I was
the last in the line?
21.
5 September
1992
Zij van Vlink
, a girl in my class, whose brother had a sort of animal magnetism for me. It
depended on her if I may walk with her brother over the school grounds. It cost
me my best books. Pure blackmail!
Rieke and
Liesje Olie and their brother , who suddenly after the war were called Olij.
The choir of Jo Toet , partner of Daniel Waayenberg, and the songs that we
sang:
The heavens
remains gloomy hung down
A dead
silence reigns supreme
Creation
grieves, she has no songs
And the organ
tone of the forest is stupid ....
That has
always stayed with me. And now comes a thought to me and a singing game over
spring from princess Irene that we learned:
We are the
hares out of the woooods
The small
hares out of the woooods
and eating a
hazelnut….
Today I read
the Nieuwe Israelitisch Weekblad (NIW)from 28 August that was sent to me from
the telephonist from the Jewish social work . The tears are in my eyes as I
read the column from G. Philip Mok: “Am Jisraeel Chai.”
I am a Jew in
heart and soul. I realize this especially , because, even though
my past was by the Martha charity
very Christian and baffling , is very
agitated by the reading of the NIW and this column.
Will anybody
ever bring my soul to her right place?
22.
Margreet was
here. With a photo album full of photos of children from the buildings of the
Martha foundation. Truly also a picture of Geert Knoet! Margreet stayed till
five o’clock. I only recognized her when I saw her childhood photos. She is now
a grown up lady and a teacher. And I have been stated as being incapable to
work.
Although I am
particularly strained, there are still no emotions that come up with the
looking, talking about and recognizing of pictures from this time. Strange ,
actually. Names , names of people and places it was not more than that. Or not
yet? Just scents come back. And the tinkle of the many chains of Miss Corvase
the German teacher
And the face
of the pathetic spinster of needlework,-who
was also bullied by me.
We talked
about the family Cote, also for Margreet a very loved family. It was a shame that Mieke had so little
attention , because her parents were caring for more than four hundred
and fifty children. And hospitality and love, that the children received from
no one else.
23.
Still 7
September , evening
I have
asked Paul, my dear friend from the past
and still, whether he wants to read my
writings. And if it may ever be a book ,
would he be my editor?
In the years
past I've never been able to tell him anything from my childhood. And
when I tried it sounded confusing and
incomprehensible to him . And still I
panicked , as he practically forced me to go into the past, how lovingly
and patiently he tried. It caused unbearable tension between us.
My strange
reactions to his innocent remarks, my off-track anxiety and panic attacks , and
I crawled into my shell when he became irritated. His bohemian - like attitude
toward my need for security. Love and security, very civil, are synonymous with safety for me. For him it means trouble, curtailing his
freedom. Doubly, as a clipped bird in a
cage. That can not continue to go well. And therefore did not go well.
After two
years of silence I made contact with him. This is also the way to tell him
about my youth, all those things, all those fears that surface. Will I persevere to the end? And will Dorine
, my friend from the Jewish social work , and Paul , my old friend , able to
provide enough support for it?
Paul also has
his stories. Stories from his childhood, how he experienced the
war. And the years after. His life is a continuous line, with peaks of course,
like an ECG., But his Memories are a common thread running through his life.
And me? I have the feeling that my life only halfway in my adulthood begins.
The way back from there is not even visible, but it must be there. I'm finally
not come into the world as an adult, or without background or parents.
24.
The memories
keep coming. There is now no stopping them. When I was fourteen , in 1949, I
could stay whenever I wanted to at my uncle Bart and aunt Marie and their two
daughters ( Marie is the one that arranged for me to be taken from my father
and placed in the Martha foundation , But I had not realized that yet). After
staying there a few times they told me , that I May leave the Martha foundation
and come and live with them, if I promised never more to have contact with my
father! I did not realize that she therefore would experience the ultimate
triumph, by taking my father’s only child away- for good - after years
before, my father had me taken away from her. He told me once how he
accidentally had witnessed how they mistreated me and how he then took me, but
that's another story. Aunt Marie thought she’d
have cheap household help from
me? Until that point I knew no more about housekeeping than drying up .
After a short period of reflection I refused to give up my father. I had to
return to the Martha charity and I never stayed there again! They cried with
anger and disappointment but I never regretted my decision. Even though I was
thus in the Martha Foundation, and even though I was not yet aware of the
purpose and background.
Yet I was
then, just as unconsciously, an arrogant weight. I must have been nineteen
years and I just started working in the council office in the town of Woerden.
I had left the Martha foundation and was free to visit my father. With him in
Amsterdam, also lived uncle Coen (his brother) and his wife Aunt Cor. Uncle
Coen was a park worker and I worked in an office. I suggested that he was a
staff member and I officer. Absurd and ridiculous. We had words, it was not fun
anymore. Maybe I wantedto offend them by punishing them for leaving me in the
Martha foundation. In my childhood I stayed
with my father and with them?
Then they had to stay together in a house and were busy trying to get my father
, who was alone out, because they had a family. Grandpa was already dead….
25.
Grandpa !
That small house that I can still smell. Grandpa , whom I passionately loved,
who sat me on his lap , read and played with me, who cut all the cartoons out
of the newspaper and pasted them in a big book for me and upstairs there was
more big books and cartoons and other things were I was allowed to play . I
realized that in later years my grandpa and my father , played a smaller role
in my life , among other reasons , because, they both did more for the
youngsters of number 88( grandpa lived at number 90 on the Plaatijzerweg) and
for their mother, auntie Ella. I felt that I did could not come between or be
involved there .But the short time that I lived with my father and grandfather
and came to auntie Ella’s and played with the youngsters , Henk and Erich ( it
was not longer than a half a year), was the only rally happy time of my youth.
Back to the
Martha Foundation.
It's the
feeling. No conscious memory. It must have been dark, cold and wet. Rain and
wind, when I arrived in Nieuwersluis.
I have the
same feeling when I think of how I was brought
from one hiding place to another
to a person's hand, with maybe a briefcase or a bag in the other hand.
Actually I
can’t remember real memories out of that period. It is like a thin black veil
which is located over the entire past. You see it and know that there is something behind, but to see
through it is so difficult. There is nothing, even for only a moment,
illuminated, allowing you to see everything clearly.
I was there,
at Serreschans, in Nieuwersluis. It stank and was noisy and humid. In the
evening we folded our clothes on our shoes ,
some wore wooden shoes - so that we could flee if necessary.
26.
I had nightmares, others banged evening and
night with their heads rhythmically against the headboard of their bed. I know
of at least one time I'm sleepwalking into the dining room to sit and sat there all night, with my arms folded. Until the group came for
breakfast and woke me up. That is how it was told to me later on. Geert Knoet had to – with cold water- wash and
dress me completely.I seem to have come far away.
During every
air raid, all attacks on or near the railway line Amsterdam - Utrecht, we dove
at night under the beds. Or during the day, under the tables or in the ditch.
And when we gathered wood in the forest across the street, we looked panicked
for a tree to stand against.Their was a farm in the forest. If we were there in
the area we pushed in and stood against the wall. One child from the group once
stole something there. For that , later on all of us got one at a time , a beating. Geet Knoet knew how to give a
beating. And I never had the impression that she did so reluctantly.
Two
dormitories. Hepatitis broke out, jaundice, diarrhea and vomiting. Then we got
punishment. If you had to throw up everything was shoveled back on the board,
different food put over it and you had to eat it .
For days you
were given the same plate of food . That really happened.
On Friday
afternoon we went for a bath. Very soapy water, probably there was no real soap
anymore .All forty children went into the same bath water at least that is how
I remember it. I definitely remember on a Friday after the bath , leading
everybody to their knees beside the bed
. There we were in our our nightdresses or pyjamas , and I spoke facing where I believed East to
be out a prayer. Where did I get that from! Even Geert Knoet later on knelt and prayed with me.
27.
In that time
, I had also knowledge of everything that was eatable, and there was a lot edible
in the big garden around the grounds of Sterrenschans. I seemed to know
what wild rye and wheat were, which fruit was edible, which mushrooms were
poisonous. There was a bush with bright red fruits that we definitely had to
stay away from .But somehow or another I knew that the fruits were definitely
not poisonous. And they were really tasty. Since I had eaten it, they had ,
probably with fear and trembling, waited a day and then the bushes were looted.
What was left over was made into jam. The strange thing is that I lost some of
that knowledge after the war and was only returned in my high school years. How
could I, a city kid from Amsterdam and Wenen , know all those things and use it
too?
Cold ,
wetness, stink and fear. The feelings prevail over the war violence.
Why, dammit,
do I not remember how and by we I was
taken away from my father? Or how I was taken away from my mother ? I feel
darkness. Screaming and shouting from every side?
The panic of
then is again totally back. Bugger up all! Leave me alone.
12 September
1992
The past
won’t leave me alone. Now I have started voluntary work in abundance. I speak to a lot of people who want to talk
about the flash that one has seen in me in early news. That was at the
conference ”The hiding child” . That lasted three days , but the first day I
could not handle it, and I left in the afternoon.
Now their
stories are coming out. …. The stories from people that can’t forget how their
friends, and their classmates disappeared. How the rumors about treason and
hiding of teachers and teachers who disappeared and aunts and uncles and so on. Me they had never associated
therewith.
28.
18 September
1992
It's hard to
get hold of this book.I don’t feel physically fit and the doctor won’t allow me
to give blood for the red cross before he has his self-done an examination.
Still I want
to go back. Not to the time of hiding, but to the time before that. What do I
really remember from the time with my mother? Blank memories come up, real
memories!
We lived in
the Vrolikstraat in Amsterdam. I am in the living room playing with my dolls
house with real lights. My father made that. The curtains are closed, the
lights are burning.
In the back
room there is singing with guitar and mandolin en…violin? Austrian (mountain)
songs, Dutch hiking songs, operetta songs. I feel good about it, even though
I'm alone, but with Kareltje- Karlchen will have mentioned him- my big wooden
doll out of Wenen, whose legs moved back and forward when you moved his legs.
When we went for walks he walked beside me, then Mutti or someone else held his
other hand and we waved them back and forth.
Jetje my
neighbor .We play in the garden .Jetjes mother is with my mother. We ran on the
veranda , into the kitchen. But Jetje stepped in the wooden veranda onto a big
nail. I feel sick, because she had so much pain . Typical, such a reaction.
We play at
Jetjes in her house. She has a grandpa, who lives in the back room. One day
grandpa does something “dirty” . He takes his willy out and hold it against me
and Jetje. We were not allowed to talk about it. We found it so interesting,
that straight away we tell it to Jetjes mother…..The next day grandpa is gone
and Mutti wont talk about it.
Auntie Hilda,
Mutti and me walk in the Leidsestraat. Mutti has a yellow dress on with small
blue roses. I am playing hopscotch , pavement on , pavement off and sprain my
ankle. That hurts so much that I nearly faint. Mutti takes me in her arms .
Then I pee on her beautiful new dress and from shock I begin to cry really
hard.
I have warts
under my foot and was with her at the doctor. He burns them away and I
scream out. When that is done , is Mutti
talking with the doctor and I walk around and stand on something that is glass
that cuts my foot open. Mutti was upset and apologized extensively with the
doctor, but does not look at my foot.
With a lot of
kids at the same time we are at a clinic. In the entrance of the door stands a
doctor,who will cut out our tonsils. He gives a speech, where the mothers are.
He promises the kids (I think he overlooks me) a scooter with square wheels, if
they are very sweet.I am furious. I also want a scooter with square wheels, but
he has not promised me anything and I don’t want to go with them in. Without
mother , all doctors and nurses and strange big stools….And PAIN! With force
they opened my mouth, there is pain and blood in my throat. Panic!
Later on I got a present from Mutti, but not a
scooter with square wheels.
The front
room is the children’s room. The curtains, the cushions on the home made
plywood stools, the tablecloth, the curtain for the home made cupboard- everything
is covered in thin light blue material with small yellow and pink flowers. I
have a lot of toys, more than other children. My father makes a lot . I think
that he also made the furniture and the lamp.
But I am
rather at my auntie Jo, who lives behind us and has eight children. There it is
always busy and cozyThat is where I would rather eat, not at home, sometimes
Mutti eats there too.
Looking back,
it seems like I come from far away. Another time, different atmosphere. The noise outside
overwhelms me here. Then the reassuring noise
of the refrigerator takes over.
Back. Other
memories.
Across the
street is a sweet shop. Sometimes I get a whole penny to buy sweets.Then I go
with Jetje or with a girlfriend to look for what I want.
We always go
with a group of children, with a grown up , to the Frobel school. Then we pass
by a wasserete . Mutti is so beautiful, I am so proud when she comes with us.
Or if we go somewhere else. We go out a lot, also on visits.
Memories of
scenery, stage curtains, hollow-sounding voices and ballet practice rooms with
piano music.I am in a ballet group with other little ones But Mutti is
also very musical: she can sing and
dance and loves the theatre…
( Years later
I went with my father on a visit to a family Schubert. They came out Wenen and
knew my mother. And me as a small girl. Their home was a revelation, so
well-known and familiar to me. But the people, Mr. and Mrs. Schubert, I did not
remember.)
Mutti is
proud to make me beautiful. I remember a pink and white woolen skirt with very
nice buttons. A tartan dress of silk with a white lace apron, white silk socks
and black patent leather shoes.I feel the material now as I think about it…..
Images… They
keep coming, tumbling over each other in their haste to reveal their self to
me. I write key words in order not to forget them, not one can escape now, how
they whirl together.
31.
Argument
between my parents. The swing hangs from the doors to the veranda in the back.
They sit together around the table, maybe playing a game- and so I try
to swing that I can catch my father out. That poor sweet man.
Another
vision. I am in a holiday camp in Petten on the sea. Specially set up for the
sickly. I get there a sickness, perhaps nostalgia. It must be winter, a hard
winter. My beautiful Mutti is brought in with bloody legs and lies beside me in
the hospital ward. She has walked
far through deep snow and the hard top
layer has broken her silk stockings and rubbed her legs broken
.But she is with me again. She has to stay in bed longer than me. I don’t
remember any more, apart from that I don’t want to lose sight of her again.
Except when I go to the Frobel school. I made so many nice things and have
brought them home for her: a doily for the tea chest (with the coffee set) made by folding a countless number of times silk paper; and beautiful
things made of wire and colored
beads, such as a swing with side posts and a doll ( with a picture) on it. The
picture I made again in the Martha Foundation , I now remember.
From the
Frobel school , I remember a party. I have to run with a young boy to win a
glass of lemonade .There is two glasses: In one of them is real orangeade, the
other is colored on the inside. I win! And I pick the good glass too. He is
very mad.
A warm spring
morning. The sun has just risen. I stand with Mutti by the Bata. My father
works there. Airplanes fly overhead. Noise , bomb craters .My mother falls to
her knees , throws her hands before her face and begins to scream and cry.
War “Oh no, My God no!” Everywhere
people, everywhere panic. My father? I don’t know. My sweet , beautiful Mutti
is bleeding and crying. In my memory I am completely rigid and only see the
image and hear noise. horrible noise.
32.
Swimming in
th e sports fund bathson the Heiligeweg. I heard later that as a baby I could
swim. But there is panic, as I a toddler climb to the top of the diving board
and was suddenly discovered on the edge
of the shelf.UI was caught by a man. Mutti cried from shock.
We sleep in
the alcove ,the room in between . Beside
the back (living) room frosted glass sliding doors, which could make the
living room bigger ; beside the front
room with a wooden door .On both sides
was a bed.
Mutti often
wears a brooch from the Stefan Church in Vienna, where we must have lived. I
see the colors now before me. I find that the most beautiful thing and I climb
up on her lap often , just to see it.
Vienna. From
Vienna I remember little or nothing. A large, gray, barrack- like building
where all voices sound very hard. A big garden like a park. Or is it a park?
There I also have an Omama, that in my
memory is very big and stately, Many and very big stairs and very high. You
still see that in old films.
As I dive
into the past again without clear memories, at least without images.The feeling
of very fine porcelain The scents, the
scent of earl grey tea ,bergamot, roses, the under scent of certain perfumes, from
freesia’s: That was the scents of Mutti.
I must have
been a smart child. Bilingual, with a large vocabulary in both Dutch as East
German. And with only a faint notion of the dramas that took place around me
and the tension of the impending war. Then it was just very lucky.
33.
And suddenly
it was over.
One of the
last things I remember from the Vrolikstraat, the bomb crater is nearby, at the
corner of Van Woustraat.
19 September
1992
After all
these years, is now (of course completely unjustified, I realize that though)
great anger towards my niece Ilse, her half brother Kurt and half sister
Inge (my cousins ), not even a little
time to share with me .After Vienna- and from there I only have a photograph- I
never saw them again. Anyway Ilse has regular contact with Inge .Or is Hilda, her
mother and my aunt ( Muttis sister) responsible for that? Ilse has stayed in
England at Inge’s and sometimes Inge comes to Amsterdam. Ilse has worked on a
kibbutz. Ilse has kept her mother. Ilse is not to balame , no one is to blame.
These things just happen like that. But she has kept a whole family. I lost
everyone.
34.
Would
her mother not be responsible for the only child of her
sister? She survived, my mother was
killed. Maybe I was not really happy at hers , but I had family. Family in Amsterdam, in ,England, Austria( Vienna) and
Israel . Ilse kept those contacts. I never had them.
Bitterness is
not necessary and not good .But I still have to get rid of it.
Tonight I
read on teletext about the first really
anti-Semitic demonstration in Eastern Europe. And the decision by the Arab
countries to engage in a "holy war" against Serbia (for the Muslims
in Bosnia).
Fear strikes,
Nostradamus was right? Literally, also was the misery in Iraq predicted by him.
In 1994, Europe would be at war with Islam, and warnings would not help.
Wait and watch as Europe and Israel will
perish and America will get involved too late? So then we get World War III.
20 September
1992
Teletext ,
Page 312. Budapest. Tens of thousands of demonstrators against the president
and against the management of the Hungarian television. The Democratic Front
had warned against Jewish power.
Teletext,
page 313.If this "holy war" would continue - there is Iran an army
ready, says teletext- and if only if Saudi Arabia is against, what's going to
happen here? All those tens of thousands of young, rudderless Muslims who are
aware to be Muslims if they want nothing "to do", they will find a
purpose in this so-called holy war? A purpose to live for, an ideal? Ah heaven, then Europe will indeed be
overwhelmed by Islam, but other than
Nostradamus meant . Who predicted that the threat would come from Iran.
35.
There is an
enormous depression coming. I have to see . But what is the usefulness of the past, if there is nothing good to expect from the
future? I wrote that in a poem in 1956, when there was an uprising in Hungary.
Perhaps there is no future to live in
So we almost stand still naturally.
It seems to me, it is
far better to stay
Than to perish in the future.
I'm just here to do something else. Read Paul's
letters. He has everything I write on
the computers , and sends me the prints with a letter. Memories and things that
happen to him now, that never were related to me. About how he and his friends,
shortly after the war, were driven by nerves and panic to cause a massive blow to the garden of the Jewish family of Juultje .How much he regretted it later. How easily
he rolled over the war, his memories are
colored by his awakened wanderers
spirit.
In the newspaper Het Parool from 27 August ( why have
I not read that before now?) writes Chawwa Wijnberg: “The feeling of sadness,
anger and despair, which we (the children) as it were victimized ...)
She forgot to mention the fear and fundamental
loneliness.
I dreamed of a shindig in someone’s room. There was a
beaten up bed.Nobody danced with me, I desperately did my best to look as happy
as the others that were available.I suggested to them that we sit on the bed ,
but they did not want to do that. On leaving, someone showed me out and I just walked outside in the darkness.
Left the others behind me, and they went the other way.
36.
And I woke up
afraid.
And last night I dreamed of earthquakes and noise and
trapped between the people and I could
not go anywhere. I realized in the dream that that was the safest place
to be.
I have written to Ilse , and told her what I can
remember, or thought I could. I have asked her if she can tell me more. Maybe
her mother Hilda has told her things about my mother, my grandparents , about
Vienna. Maybe that will help me to remember things again.
21 September 1992
I want to try to continue. I have yet to discover a wide no man's land between
Mutti and the Martha foundation. I
find it very scary and it's all very murky. If I cannot find it, I must use violence. It wears me out, but also makes me stubborn.
At the beginning of this week I close this book and
send it to Dorine to read. Then after we have spoken about it , I take it back.
24 September 1992
Dorine agreed to once again pick up the image of my
mother. Like that , that is potentially imposed by my father and my family.
And try to find an answer to the question to what
extent it has affected my self-imposed image. And so my life.
Where I'm going and where I come from?
37.
Despite sleeping pills I have not slept in two nights. I'm too busy with voluntary work and
obligations thereabouts, then again, I also feel the desire to let that go and
come to myself. Does not work. Tired,
muscle and bone pain. I get up again at
05:15 and have put on coffee. Pondered
about errors and heartlessness present in others, about shortcomings in my
work. I talk too much. I've never been this way.
39.
October
41.
1 October 1992
I have fallen
into a massive depression and have layed everything (temporarily) down.
And I again feel guilty about that .... I was yesterday during a meeting
sitting at home so nervous that it was not fun anymore. It is necessary to prepare an event for
17 and 18 October, but I stuttered, could not get my words out, belittled
myself and understood little. I
feel spiritually paralyzed me and have pain all over my body. Why? What is
happening to me?
Jessica, my daughter has read the memories to Mutti.
She was happy , she said .It has given
her more information over her unknown grandma and more understanding for me.
4 October 1992
I could not do
anything the last few days. There was actually
so much work to do that I was
torn to continue, between my
desire with this book and my "love and devotion to duty" for the work
that must end 17 December, when the
municipal Platform Global Awareness is installed. All preparations for this swallowed my
time, my energy and my money. I had already given up the trade union work in
the past month, as well as my contacts
with council and commission.
Jessica had warned me that my dive in the past would
take my energy. She seems to have been right. It is still scary and it is still
not known if it is really worth it all:
I, the Jewish middle aged daughter, grew up in a
"Christian" environment, have come during this quest at a point where
I am searching for my Jewish roots. But precisely because of my past I hear,
and I feel, no longer at home in the Jewish community. What the latter may be.
42.
Anyway, here we go: the image I have of my mother. A
real image I have not so clear. A small, muscular woman, slim. And quite striking, very large eyes,
well dressed, sometimes chic. Sometimes happy, sometimes aloof. I don’t remember hug parties, nor things we did together. However, we were inseparable, which is
pretty normal for a single mother with a child.
Yet there must be, outside of the described memory, an
image that appeals to reality. Though
the knowledge from the past (not the
Memories), the fleeing and the fears of
the rising anti-Semitism before the war, persecutions, bring back real memories that I'm mentally
maimed by them. The image stays the same: My beautiful , sweet Mutti.
My father has told me about the fleeing to and from Vienna . He told me
about Hilda , whom we went together to
visit. And
he also told me that, years after the divorce, when he was long
just friends with
"mother" that he still loved
Olga . Her eyes, he could not forget them. At the same time, he really gave me
the picture with a woman, who was immensely irritated by his lack of willpower,
Only in 1963 I was, here, facing my past. I received from the Red Cross proof
of her death.perseverance and ambition. She herself had, after all, despite social opposition,
won gold medals at the Workers' Olympics in Budapest. That were immediately snatched away at
the border control in Germany, was another matter. He, my father had on his
marriage abandoned his studies in state economy to support his family. He could
not find any work in the crisis. For the support he worked in the DUW (social service’s)., but I don’t know if his
marriage was already over or not. That was the picture my father gave.
43.
Although he was a sweet, gentle man, he did not make
it with Olga, who must indeed have possessed so much more perseverance and
rationality. This is clear from what she has achieved in athletics, her
survival instinct, but also from the circles in which she must have been. Artists, theatre, musicians and the likes
of did not fit at all with the soft,
pliant and pure leftist worker boy who was my father.
I actually believe that from Olgas side, that it was a
marriage of rational considerations. However, he was lost from the moment he
saw her. That
he called her “hard” afterwards, I can understand now but it does not change
the image I have of her. That has something of defenselessness.
So far as I remember , we never talked about her in
our family. She is hushed and I was “the
poor small child” . Literally hushed .When I was at my first hiding place , at
the aunt from my father’s side, I must have asked when Mutti was coming back.” Do not complain, we'll see when she
comes back. be quiet, now it should be
over. "
No proof of her existence ever after.
A little understandable when one remembers how it was
at the time. At each address it must
look as if I belonged. And a child who complains about when Mutti was returning, was a danger
for her surroundings. The questions and even the memory was so very
quickly suppressed and eliminated by the mental and physical coercion from
outside. And
the multitude of impressions, all relocations and new environments and the
induced fears, the memories indeed disappeared. Nobody, apart from my father ,
had ever talked with me about my mother. Also after the war. It was- suddenly-
aborted. Only in 1963 was I, suddenly, confronted with my past. I
received from the Red Cross proof of her death. .A “Wiedergutmachungsgeld” from
Germany, which I can use to benefit my family. Only in that time, when I had received that relatively
small amount, I was wondering if there is somewhere maybe someone still alive
who my mother was. Despite
the obituary. Because I had two small children and a million
questions. I looked at every Jewish looking woman – Maybe she was the one? I
wrote to Israel, when I saw on television a woman that I thought looked like
Olga.
44.
As I got older, my feelings denied this
understanding of this.
There is bullying children's game in which the
children stand in a circle with a child in the middle. That one child with a hard push is
hurled to another. After such a shove you try to regain equilibrium, but before
you succeed in it, you get pushed again by another child. When you
think you are standing well
, you
are pushed before you can regain balance. That is the image I
have from my childhood. Once
I was with someone, I could hold someone. That brings a new memory in the
light. Me holding Mutti’s hand, always.
In the tram on her lap, me
doing most of the talking. I belonged
with her, I held on to her. The image I have of myself from earlier years,
after the disappearance of Mutti , is of
that child in the center of the circle.
Here in this falt in Nieuwengein, where I live from
1981, there has been change.
Divorced from my second husband, the children grown
up,I left
my soul in ” prayer” in charity work.
That is also a way of hiding from myself.
But I am
myself, Erica van Beek. A
woman for whom I could respect, despite her bouts of depression, crazy
reactions, and panic states.
There Paul and Dorine have played a big part in.
45.
9 October 1992
Yesterday I started with Dorine the
processing, and we agreed
that they would inquire about my mother
at the State Archives. The next time we will discuss when we will look for Olga
in barracks 41/0.
A picture of me as a toddler with a hat
on, has on the back the year 1939 .I was then four years old and back in
Amsterdam. A
fact that raises no recollection .
46.
Erica in 1939
47.
From Olgas letter from Westerbork to Aunt Hilda, I
took it that they had to report to the prison at the Amstelveensweg, because
she had not sewn but had pinned her star. From there, they should be sent directly to Westerbork
and Auschwitz. When
Olgas sister, my aunt Hilda died, I received from her daughter Ilse, out of her
legacy, a letter and a telegram written from Westerbrok. It was thus that I
finally collapsed and could do nothing
with the feelings that arose.
The telegram from Olga from Westerbrok
The facts as I know them now at a glance:
8 September 1942:
Letter that she is transported to Westerbrok:
10 September 1942:
Telegram from Westerbrok;
14September 1942:
Official date of death in Auschwitz.
48.
The first hiding place:
Bestevaerstraat 19 -high. Before that I was for a time
in the Bellamy- straat, anyway on the 11 August 1942.
Mutti must have disappeared around about my seventh
birthday.
Since that birthday fell on a Saturday (found on the
perpetual calendar) there is to think of a family member , in this case
certainly, that took me in because Olga had to report on Monday, 3 August 1942
at the Amstelveenseweg.
Then, on September 8, she writes that
she's " deported" to Westerbrok. That was a
"Wednesday". The telegram of September 10 was in vain. The next following day that the
train left to Auschwitz was Tuesday 14 September, the same date as her official
date of death! Indeed,
the trains always left on Tuesday?
That can mean two things. The first is that she did
not survive the journey . The second , that she indeed was “murdered” directly
when she arrived. However, it could mean , that she never arrived in Auschwitz
dead or alive….or never even left….
Help. I don’t understand!
Then in the
Bellamystraat…. Was I there for a short time by Hilda and did I
arrive on 11 August 1942 in the
Bestevaerstraat by Marie and Bart? Or at her parents?
In the Simon Sttevinstraat, in my memory a street
behind, I was by Marie and Bart.
Between 11 August 1942 and 15 December 1942, there is
a series of addresses. After the Simon Stevinstraat the Keizergracht. By whom?
After that the Prinsengracht, I also can’t remember . De Eerste
Leliedwarsstraat, in the middle of the Jordaan. A crooked house with sloping
floors.It stood under construction for many years. I remember that I must have been at a
cousin of my father. That
the sloping floor was broken and the furniture too and smelly. Wooden floor and
a damp stinking kitchen. The people there could not do anything about it : The
houses were not maintained. In a room lay a pile of patches or blankets, that
is where I slept. In another room there was a window that looked upon a house,
where Chinese people lived. Sometimes if I look outside and
saw the boys with their beautiful white shirts and their black trousers. I
found them soooo beautiful!
49.
After that in Hoorn , Keern number 32 or 24. A sister
of my father, aunt Bets, married with Aart den Ouden, three children. That was
a real family.I slept with their daughter in one bed. We went after the harvest searching
opium poppy. That was in the Kennemerland. The stubble in the country
short mowed grass caused bleeding legs and feet. How was
the reaction to that? I don’t know anymore. All that we
could find we put in the pants with
elastic in the legs and was given at
“home". Sometimes we kept apples or pears for ourselves and we eat them in
bed.
In the town center was a peacock cage and the school
was nearby.I went to the school with a neighbor boy, whose parents were
informants. This is less of a memory than what I was told later. The Germans
marched by our house, singing ”Auf der Heide bluht ein kleines Blumelein und
dass heisst Erika…” And me, with my
Austrian background pulled on the trouser leg of the sergeant and said: “Ikch
heiss auch Erika.” However,
on the shoulders of the Germans I've been several times to school. Then I was
soon gone from Hoorn.
Then I again ended up with Marie and Bart. In Amsterdam North, Vijfde
Vogelstraat 17. Marie
was hard. Father said that he had fled
from the “Arbeitseinsatz” and came home.
He lived a distance of twenty five meters away and came to visit me, and caught
Marie , just as she was giving me a beating. It must have been a hard quarrel
before he retrieved me and took me to grandpas. I was not allowed to see Marie
again. That was not necessary; I now had grandpa and the two neighbor boys Henk
and Erich. And I had the only happy half a year of my youth, since my mother’s
disappearance.
Marie took revenge and reported me. Probably at the Council for Child
Protection. On the 15 December 1943, a cold, wet, dark day, I was again removed
and brought to the Martha Foundation, then in Nieuwersluis.
Well, there
is a very clear result. That Rivka (Ella) has informed several times to me.
That I have interested! Family, only it never was told me.
What remained
was a lie. And denial. In this case, two different things. But that’s another
story.
I have
immediately written back to Ilse and told her that I have received a letter
from Olly. I hesitate to send her a copy of it.
6 November 1992
Dear Ilse,
I am writing
back straight away. Thank you very much for your letter. Now I can write back
to Schachter. I had already written
evidence about mother's death, but now I can explain to him how it is.
In the meantime
I have received a letter from aunt Olly. I will send you a copy, but hesitate
because she did not- how shall I say this- write so friendly about your mother.
Let me know if you wish to receive the letter-and you can.
As for me, I
want to find the truth. Olly is not so young anymore and it was a hectic time
then. But I must do it with hypotheses. These are often 'ouch'. Would I
however, be reconciled with the past, then I will have to continue for the time
being to write. A journalist friend wants to make a book of my quest. And the
KRO wants to dedicate a radio show to it.
This came about because of ads I've posted in the hope that there are
still people alive who knew Olga .
No, nil comma
zero reactions.
In the book
that I am writing, about the hiding, the Martha Foundation, and the like
are discussed, but mainly my search for
Olga.
Meanwhile I
have, thanks to you, a past back that is mine. A kind of wholeness, whereas
before my life began only in my early adulthood and all that had happened to
"another child named Erica '. You understand? Thanks again.
Wholeheartedly. We are getting closer, you notice that too?
Very cordial
greetings and until the next letter,
Erica
77.
Indeed, I am
aware that, where this story began as a personal process, it is now my mother's story. I think it is about the
fact that I want to know these things, she could have told me if she not- so
young - had been killed. Others, including Jessica, hear the stories of home
and about the past. That is the most normal thing in the world!! ouch- in this
paradise, that is called the
Netherlands.
It's very
selfish and I have never felt so self-centered and prepared. But I consciously
try the pain, the anguish, the misery and the flights and keep fleeing from day
to day all those millions.
Because I
have to live in my life. And so far it has not been.
Tomorrow
firstly I will write back to Schachter
and aunt Olly.
11 November
1992
The anniversary of Jacobs’s death. I am thinking back to that hopeless, terrible
day, six years ago. Looking for the poem that I wrote. And another, that I
wrote as I was mourning for Jacob in 1986.
78.
Jacob
I have known
you- and not known you my child
- I have a
picture of you, that is called Jacob;
And image of
rebellion, fury and suffering
That binds
you to my past.
I have built a picture of you, my child,
That put his
arms around me and held my hand.
Not the boy
who destroyed his life
But
one who finds life fearful and unlivable.
That scared
and angry and on the run
in life never found a shelter
and disbanded
from his fear by his death
I loved you,
my child that we knew.
And
powerless, I watched how you
have wounded
yourself so deadly.
Nieuwegein, 1986
79.
Who wants to
hear
how trumpeter
grief
Who will not
run away
for my
nocturnal crying….
Hear how the
land
shakes under
my feet thumping
looking
crying
Screaming for
my children....
their hunters
continue to
be injured
And flee
for my
boundless grief ...
About him and
his name
can turn
around
Flights as I
approach
come seeking
solace…..
I want their
names
not know him
forget
Never love
again no more
do not be
complicit….
Do not come
closer
I liked you
even trust
Again
memories
should be to
what was….
And who wants
to hear….
80.
11 November,
later
I still have
written the letter to Schachter. With "urgent" on the envelope.
Because in the mailbox was a letter from the 'Division for Personal
Commemoration,' say 'the department Commemoration of Persons ":
"We
propose to inform that one page witness statement to commemorate your loved
ones, family and friends, who lost their lives in the Holocaust, are added.
The Pages of
Testimony will be included in the computer and stored in the Hall of Names at
Yad Vashem. A second notice with the names registered shall be sent to you next
month. "
Yes, hasty
and erroneous data
12 November
1992
If I have
ever had the illusion that humanity has become wiser and better, it is now
absolutely over. At the time of Gorbachev, I still had hope. Ethnic and
nationalist wars that since robbery and especially in the 'civilized' Europe
have broken make me realize that humanity has learned nothing. I have always
expressed the opinion that the "masses" consists of individuals, who
each have their responsibilities with respect to themselves and their fellow
men. I take the view back without extreme bitterness, but with the sad
realization that it was an illusion. The "dumb masses indeed. The masses
seem to have a need for a negative individual, projecting above ground level,
head and shoulders. His pursuit the ideals of the global village? The only
thing that still exists thereof is the data of the news distributionA message
from the newspaper yesterday, a headline: 'Bosnia Muslims are actually
threatened with extinction. ‘
And the world
is watching.
Yesterday I
passed the pieces from my tray from the town hall. And immediately an alarm
bell was raised. For the new municipal
identitieskaart is a counterpart of what the (jew) got on the Ausweiss: an
asterisk with a number (eg * 76 468.) For Moluccans!
'Moluccans'
indeed have a 'special status' in the Netherlands. But the name and picture
together should be sufficient recognition? Along with the smear campaign
against so-called illegal immigrants gives me the conviction that the
"Ausweiss bitte," mandating us of wearing - and showing-
identification at any request is only a matter of time. And then the shift to the
right and nationalism also struck here. Because only 'real' Dutch have a
municipal identification.
Of course I
have taken the necessary steps. Also to get this publicity, but you have to
wait and see how it is picked up and whether one sees the danger.
Below the letter in translation I wrote to
Rabbi Schachter enclosing a copy of Olgas note, her telegram and the evidence
of her death.
11 November1992
Dear Rabbi
Schachter,
My heartfelt thanks
for your letter of 16-10-'92, but above all for your loving attention.
As you can
understand it for me indeed a shock to have read and found out that there is
already a Page. I needed a few days to get over the shock and to discover that
the story in the Page was wrong with the reality.
This morning
I received a note from the 'Division for Personal Commemoration,’ my mother is
registered on the basis of your story. Please, undo, it was too fast, too
hasty. I do not blame you, you were full of good intentions and truly believed
in what you found.
Truth is, I
send you:
1 An almost
illegible note, which my mother wrote on the way to Westerbrok on Wednesday 8
September 1942, to her sister Hilda. The original can be found in the
Resistance Museum in Amsterdam;
2 A copy of a
telegram that my mother sent to her sister from Westerbrok on September 10,
1942. The original of this is found in the Resistance Museum in Amsterdam;
3 An excerpt
from the municipality of Amsterdam, which shows that my mother, Olga Bock, was murdered in
Oswiecim (Auschwitz) in Poland, and that she was the daughter of Jozefa Karpfen
and Armin Bock. Also showing that she had been married to Jacob van Beek, my
father;
4 Finally, a
letter from the Dutch Red Cross information office.
The last two
letters I received, as you can see, already in 1963, when I was married with my first husband. They were the only
evidence, then, that I had, that she had ever lived. Many years later, when my
mother's sister died, I received that note and that telegram. And that was
that. Make from it your own story...
Now, after
receiving your last letter, I tried to get in touch with Ilse, the daughter of
my mother's sister. That sister survived and died about ten years ago. I
translate for you part of the letter I received:*.
Until there
the letter I received from my cousin.
When I
received your letter, I thought that I was crazy or had a wrong picture in my
mind of the past. It took a while before I realized that that was not the case
and that no second Olga Bock existed with the same background. One possibility
was then, that the Israeli cousin had her own story about my mother, which I
discovered, was true, as you see.
As for my father is the following. He was not
a Jew, but he did not get me after the war to take care of me.
*see page 74.
83.
Hilda would
not do that *, as I have discovered. So I had to stay in that very Christian
orphanage until I was 19 years old. And I had to forget everything (had
forgotten all) of my first childhood.
The truth
about my life and that of my mother is really complicated. I have to rediscover my past and my memories now.
That's why I try to write down on that quest, everything about that trip to the
past. A good friend, a journalist, is willing to make a real book. Not to get a
bestseller, but for my children, my ex-husband and my friends: who are
interested in my mental journey.
I hope you that you will give my mother the
ultimate right in the Page, to fill in the new found truth. This letter is the
report for The Hall of Names. I will be very grateful if you would change the
existing one.
A picture of
my mother and me as a little child (I have changed a bit over the past fifty
years) is now re-created and if necessary I will send it to you in due course.
The
unfamiliar uncle or cousin, I will not write, but maybe would you be so kind as
to tell him what I have written?
Finally, I
would like to express my greatest gratitude, and I hope you will write me back.
You are at this moment the thread that connects me to Yad Vashem, the place
where my mother will get a fair and beautiful place, where she is at home.
Yours
sincerely,
Erica
* Or had they
no authorization for that purpose? There is evidence? I could not find any..
84.
13 November
1992
Today the
papers are again full of terrible things that are happening in the former
Yugoslavia. Murders, mutilations, rapes.... How will the survivors continue to
live? Demonic primitiveness still requires an equally primitive response:
Bombard the so-called purified areas where Serbs live alone. A little each day
until they surrender. Naturally, hundreds of innocent will die, but on the
other hand maybe the horror finally ends and the other population group not
only feels avenged, but not otherwise is wiped out and can return to their
place. That is never going to be good between the people and the neighboring
countries. Now if there was only intervention! Before Muslims come to 'help'
from the Middle East. Oh, poor Yugoslavia, what should it be?
In the Netherlands there is still hope left.
Saturday, November 14 at the Tropical Museum in Amsterdam a meeting of the
Labour Party 'adorned' with a pocket
line of AFKA, Anti Fascism Committee Amsterdam, to show that not all the
Netherlands is behind the smear campaign against illegal immigrants.
Good, further
with my mental journey.
14 November
Yet to go
back to yesterday. The meeting of the Labour Party was due to 'circumstances
‘not in Amsterdam but in The Hague. And according to the, I would say,
naturally present ME, there was only fifty autonomists that demonstrated and
therefore naturally were beaten away and had to be arrested.
Fortunately
it penetrates to the media that the smear campaign against illegal immigrants
is wrong. Refugees or not, but everything is lumped together! An embarrassment
for politics? Am I not a voice of the people? Such things affect me deeply!
85.
Following is
the translation of the letter I wrote today to aunt Olly in London. In itself a
partial evaluation, actually only scheduled for late December.
Dear aunt
Olly,
Thank you
very much for your letter. It answered very many questions that I had all my
life. I am sorry that you know so little, but what you do know, brought back so
many memories again and made me aware again of many things.
This is a
very long letter, prepare yourself then for?
Ilse has also
helped me a lot.
I'm going to
tell what I remember, or have come to learn or have read.
My father,
Jaap, who died on 28 November 1976, has always told me that he continued to
love Olga his entire life. In 1938 (of'37), he begged Olga to marry him again,
for her own and my safety. She refused, probably left Vienna when he came there
and told him according to his own words, to marry Hilda, because she would,
with her two children need him a lot more. That would be the reason (can) he
married Hilda, according to him, just to help Hilda and her two children. I
suppose neither Olga nor Jaap knew anything about the fact that you would take her
with her two children to England. As it is told, Jaap went to Amsterdam and
Hilda soon followed. They had both before and during the war, often the same
address, but never lived together.
Olga and I
came back later to Amsterdam. As Hilda told Ilse, still a little
surprised: "She came sailing down
the Danube." Ilse had her own image
(by the way it was talked about)
from the book Uncle Tom's Cabin: Eliza, jumping from ice floe to ice floe on
the Ohio River, to escape the slave trader and to save herself and her child .
86.
It must have
been a very traumatic journey and an escape in the nick of time to Holland.
Jews were then no more allowed public transport, train or bus travel. I have no
memories of that, even though I was there. Never mind. I will leave it at that.
Maybe my fears, panics and bad dreams are the root cause.
When Olga was
taken away in August '42, she assumed that I was safe with Hilda, according to
the note she wrote just before she reached camp Westerbrok. Shortly after began my life as a so-called "Hidden
Child.” There followed a number of addresses, where I, as a Jewish child was
not really welcome. Until I came in the winter of '43 to that very Christian,
very cruel orphanage, where I remained until my nineteenth year. When I was 'free'
from there , I had to my knowledge no
other real family other than my father,
who over the years, faithfully visited me each visiting day. Oh yes, I knew
Aunt Hilda, Louis and Ilse, I had some relatives on Jaap's side, and to kill
some time I had visited them with Jaap (very rarely I had permission to go with
him for a few days in my summer holidays).But there was no family ties,
not with Hilda, nor with Jaap's side. I
also don’t remember anything about the brief encounter with you and Inge. There
must have been from the beginning simply too much sadness, anger and trauma in
me.
Now I have to deal with that past. There is
indeed much to forgive, especially Hilda, who during and after the war
abandoned me .Her child and she were quite safe because she was married to my
father, a non-Jew. Yet Ilse and Hilda sat in Westerbrok for a time, but came
out safely, through that marriage, I think. After the war, Jack and Hilda got
divorced straight away, so she could marry Louis.
The last
eleven years I have been very active for ‘disabled *’ for refugees, gypsies,
for society in all its forms.
87.
As a
volunteer. I had and have no ordinary pension. It is a pension for victims of
persecution, especially Jewish people. Just like my grandmother Joszefa (Ilse
wrote to me about her), a militant woman of the labor movement. I have even
been, for a number of, a member of the Communist Party of the Netherlands,
which no longer exists. I chose the wrong husbands and separated from them. The
wrong lovers and discontinued that relationship again. Now I'm grateful that I
live alone since my now adult daughter Jessica has left home.
Returning to
Hilda: I, but also, Inge and Kurt have her, I think, to forgive, a lot. I will
reach that pointof forgiveness in the near future. I am slightly conscious of
the fact that I'd never have been the same helpful woman, if things had turned
out otherwise. Do you understand what I mean? Life is just the way it is and
I've been through it, for whatever reason. We will have to accept and live our
lives. While the rest of the world is just about on fire. I agree with you,
that it is terrible.
Back to your
letter. I think it was the excuse that
Hilda could not get me back because she had been married to my father. * But I
want to believe that she was unable to bring me up because of everything that
had happened before and maybe Louis did not want me. Ilse has never been able
to understand this and despite her loyalty to her mother, she is in her heart
still angry, about much bigger things, but also because of me. I can understand
.
*however, it
may have been true. Only recently was it publicized in publications that the
Child Protection used that excuse at the time. Better Christian than Jewish,
they found.
88.
Now about
Olga. As I have discovered recently, the
following things happened:
-On September
8, 1942 she was released from prison in Amsterdam, where she was detained for
the simple fact that her 'star' was pinned instead of sewn. The Germans are
still very 'gründlich' as you know.
-On September
10 she sent a telegram to Hilda from
Westerbrok to send her the Aryan papers of Jack, but it was too late,
because
- On
September 11 '42 she died in Auschwitz. The journey lasted three days.
This is true
according to all the information that I have, official and informal. So that
should be accepted. She fortunately only suffered for a short time. And now I
am able to bury her, to give her a grave and a Page of Testimony at Yad Vashem
in the Hall of Names in Jerusalem, for the victims of the Holocaust. And now I
am able to remember my mother and some of my childhood. That heals me in a way;
it makes me whole, so to speak. A woman with a past that I previously could not
remember because of the terrible things that had happened. With "Today"
writing, thinking and remembering. And with a future, long or short, but worth
living.
That is what
I mean by ‘whole’. And perhaps cured, healed, through that journey into the
past itself. And at my age, 57 years old!
Only that
part of Hilda keeps crossing my mind. I'll have to think over and over, until I
can forgive her. Can you understand that? Oh yes, I have still something to
ask.
From what
Jaap has told me about Olga, about you and about Vienna, I always understood
that you and Olga were great friends.
89.
Maybe indeed
just because of the sports club, as you wrote. But really not above that level?
How is it that Jaap admired you so much, almost worshiped you? Only because of
your part in this tragedy in Vienna? Or because you were good friends with Olga
and her family? Her best friend, whom she trusted, like Hilda trusted in Olga?
Maybe Hilda was very much a dependent, very childlike and she could not make
decisions for herself or defend herself? You and Olga must have been strong
personalities, you were well-qualified sportswomen. Maybe she felt more or less
forced into what she did, first by Olga and others, later by Lois. My father
had therein little to say. It would explain a lot of things, if that was so.
Today,
everywhere with wars and misery in the world and especially in Eastern Europe,
with refugees, I am also not able to let
any of them stay in my house, legal or illegal. It would break me. Do
you understand what I'm saying? Oh, I want to reach that point of forgiveness!
Would you
please write me back? Even if you think you cannot really tell me anything of
what happened or cannot help me further.
Until then,
I'm still sincerely yours,
Erica
15 November
1992
So, that has
put everything nicely in a list. Albeit superficial , about my lovers is not
quite honest .Only one of them was a jerk and I realized that almost too late.
The one that I cannot mention here, still has a big place in my heart. Life
itself made and end to our relationship. And Paul, oh well. I loved him very
much, but we did not fit spiritually together.
90.
My frustrated soul could not bear his
affection towards his ex-wife and ex-girlfriends. Superficially seen, pure
jealousy. But it was not that alone. In a love relationship, I should feel
perfectly safe, and that I was not. I always enjoyed what he did, his writing
and his poetry; have learned everything I know of graphic art from him. But a
relationship, a lasting bond of love was something impossible. Fortunately, we
can now be close friends. Now I trust him so much that I have asked him to help
make this book.
A little
reminder comes up with a few notes during commercials.
Kommt ein Vogel geflogen
Setzt sich nieder auf mein Fuss
Hat ein Breifel in sein Schnabel
Von der Mutti ein Gruss
Leiber Vogel fleig weiter
Nimm ein Kuss mit und ein Gruss
Denn ich kann dich nicht begleiten
Weil ich hier bleiben muss
En dan
Hoppe hoppe reite
Wer da fallt der schreit er
Fallt er in den Graben
Fressen ihn die Raben
Fallt er in den Plumpf Macht der
Reiter ‘Humpf’
There will
sometime come back more songs. It shows that as a child I had singing and music
played to me. About that fact itself I remember nothing. At the Mulo we learned from our German
teacher songs like ‘Das Standchen’ from Schubert and Weihnachtslieder as ‘Schlaf wohl, du susser kleine du' that I
knew how to play at once and that just
came to my mind now. It was already in there! Strange, that it just comes to
mind now. Hey Erica, remain rational
91.
I have given
myself a bunch of phlox as a gift. It smells overwhelming. It is mid-November;
imagine it, an engine will not start from the cold and damp. I sit with my butt
almost touching the heater. Behind my back, it is almost winter and my nose
smells mid-summer. Crazy huh? That is only in this crazy frog country.
17 November
1992
Today was
again a puzzle of the past. First with
Dorine then later with Elma.
It is
impossible to continue to do this rationally. My throat is tight and my head is
spinning still. Tonight my girlfriend An was here play a game of dice. I've kept it inside until
now, a quarter past twelve at night.
Dorine and I
went back to two key questions:
1. How did Olga end up in jail? And
2. Hilda, with some difficulty could she
have kept me?
Olga was not
the type, that has now become clear that
would report under orders. It is possible that Hilda, Olga and I walked on the
street and were arrested by the (Dutch) police officer, if only because of the
stars. That Olga was picked from the street because her star was pinned. The
note makes it clear that Hilda knew! That makes Elma’s suggestion actually a
little off, that Olga was alone on the street. In the circuit to which Olga had
gathered around her there were only Jews (the names Schubert, mentioned
earlier, and Hirsch came back in my mind). They may have been someone else
walking in the street, who could have
escaped it and warned Hilda – at Olga’s
request. But the most likely explanation is still the first. They still had to
get their quantum of Jews? And she sat in a Dutch house of detention on the
Amstelveenseweg. It was at a time in the beginning of the straatrazzias, before
entire streets were taken away. Imagine how that happened. That I myself have
no reminder of that event, says nothing. Too traumatic things, at least to
me, are well shielded. But my heart is
pounding at this moment again from the fear: the most familiar and unwelcome
feeling of my life.
92.
Olga was
picked up by a Dutch policeman. They still had to get their quantum Jews? And
she sat in a Dutch house of detention on the Amstelveenseweg. It was in the
beginning of the street raids, before whole streets were picked up.
Imagine how that happened. That I myself
have no reminder of that event, says nothing. Too traumatic things, at least to
me, are well shielded. But my heart is pounding at the same time again of fear:
the most familiar and unwelcome feeling of my life.
Maybe I'll
get to do regression hypnosis before this book is finished. For all these
things to really face definitely.
Hilda again- according to Dorine and Elma
it is not impossible that Hilda was
really not assigned me by the OPK
(commission War Foster children) *. Because they thought that I was better off
at the Martha foundation than my own familiar family, who were not Christian.
And by a 'Pulse' had nothing more and had to start all over again. Hilda’s
guilt to Olga and later to me, rightly or wrongly - that I have no judgment on
may have meant that she later has not looked back at me. But also her character
and Louis could have contributed. I simply could not see into her heart and she
did not speak. In the next letter I write I will ask this of Aunt Olly and
Ilse. Hilda they barely knew, of course, I'm not sure if she made real trouble
for me. But those very "Christian" ladies and gentlemen of the OPK
and Child Protection Agency I can well imagine, there you need only to turn to
the book of Elma. If Hilda approached the Jewish members of the OPK, also
remains a mystery. For eternity. Okay, I want to give her the benefit of the
doubt; she has not had it so easy.
* A committee
consisting of mainly non-Jewish, very Christian people.
93.
Yet..... Why?
But that's
what life is sometimes, Erica. Tomorrow I will call Hedda van Gennep for more
background information on those months in '42.
A comforting
word for tonight, tomorrow is my daughter here to eat and we go happily to the
world shop, to buy groceries.
18 November
1992
My daughter
now has read everything and actually without comment laid down the books.
I see how
important I think how she experiences it. Well, for her it is the history, the
intricate story of her mother's childhood and family. She finds it, like
Dorine, that I am changing throughout the process. I myself don’t have that
feeling yet, though I hope that it comes. Apart from Dorine I still cannot
really talk about it. It is, really complicated and the distance remains.
A result must
be, that I learn to trust again. And not to build a facade of self-awareness
and self-confidence in my personal contacts. With Dorine I can let go of it,
proud and happy with what I do and did and have achieved. With others I can
never talk about it, if it concerns me at least. About the work I did and do I
myself feel good, but I always feel as a sort of middleman and know exactly who
does things better. It has for example resulted in the identification of the
appropriate chairman of foundation * Property, which actually does it better
than I would ever do it. Or initiating and defending things that I really believed
in, but where others had to play the responsible role. Further I stay humble in the background, , and allow others the honor
that I get sometimes.
*An
organization for the sole purpose of obtaining its own global center.
Am I chaotic-
still- to a demanding task with responsibility for me to take? Or am I just
"shy"?
94.
Put me in a
room with eight hundred anonymous, it goes well. But personal contacts, with
all the warmth I feel for those people. I often hyper- ventilate. And I notice
that only when I am alone again. I realize it's not just a matter of
misanthropy, despite all the social skill.
The underlying cause is distrust in honesty of
others towards me. A wrong expression, glance or a curt answer, and I am gone.
Feel (again) rejected. Something from earlier time. I distrust such a person
for a very long time. Uncertainty. Anxiety. Fear that they see through me. That
is why I seek the attack: If you think "That man is crazy," I am at
that time also. But it passes by itself.
The knowledge
of the past, of all that misery, leading to fear, significant uncertainty,
anxiety, that leads to depression does not help. It realized that again today.
Will that
also get better? It hinders my real development; it keeps me in second or third
place. Not that I'm ambitious. But it's a false modesty, and resulting from
fear to really stand out. It's something from the hiding and the Martha
Foundation. How do you overcome something like this? and is that really
necessary? Am I not so terribly tired of that eternal struggle with myself,
that I see ghosts? And am I not ready to take a step back and not take on
challenges or cross barriers anymore? That is the easy path. No fear of people,
personal contacts with the rest of the "family," which are not going
well currently. And no friends? I surely think to have. How uncertain and tense
that I am. It's not a solution, to become a nun? A hermit? Just now that I'm
complete? But what and how?
95.
I not called Hedda van Gennep yet. Fear, like
with Elma, there again those fears. It was long before I was through that with
Elma, too long. How is it that I do not have that with Dorine? I then stay
rational? In the time.
I myself
think that it might have to do with being prepared. You do not feel robbed,
despite your questions.
Today
Memorboek has arrived. ‘The plate’s atlas of the life of Jews in the
Netherlands from the Middle Ages until 1940’. A book almost as large and as
thick as the King James bible. All the pages reveal that this history is also
mine. I despite my not – believing but still a real Jew, unlike, yes, then
what? That I'm closer to that side than the Dutch side that represents my
father. Not so crazy, apart from the biological provability, to be a child of a
Jewish mother still being Jewish!
I made it
again today. In a regional meeting of the Association of Dutch Municipalities
over municipal global policy. I suddenly got the economist Adam Smith (right
and pure capitalist) under my nose pushed through by a VVD lady: "The
public interest is most profitably encouraged where each individual can freely
pursue his own interests."
I fumed with
rage, literally. So the world is not like that. The law of the jungle prevails
and only the strong will always be at the expense of the weak, which will never
be unimpeded or even could aspire. Think about this "Global Village,"
which is our world. I ask her this, as controlled as possible, 'How big - do
you think - is the percentage of people in our ‘Global Village ', that can
freely pursue their own interests? And is that – ethically speaking -own
interest not only appropriate to the smallest common denominator?'
She did not
answer, but came afterwards to me to talk about it. I said- it was in the
meeting a municipal global policy, east- west and north-south relations - East
and West should never meet here because she was a follower of Adam Smith and I
of Marx.
96.
Again there was silence, and then she said:
"But that does not mean that we have to hate each other, right?" No
it does not, but friends? At such a moment I feel again at one with the
persecuted, the oppressed, that is where I belong. Among the Jews, the Jewish
Marx, as well, if I'm honest, all oppressed peoples that come up in revolt who
flash through my mind.
Links dead? No, but left and right do not let
the back of their tongue be seen, in order not to arouse resistance? Or are we
becoming a- political?
I should in the future be more wary of the
individual motives and self-interest, which should be pursued because in the
approach of the right it cannot go differently in practice, than at the expense
of the oppressed, in my feeling. The making of a new political awareness?
Hey discovery?
Sticking to
the old values, which I - unconsciously have ingested and have tested the
breast milk and found to be correct in my adult life, Jewish huh? This is ebbing my anger.
Every day a
thread is a shirt sleeve in the year.
20 November
1992
I was putting
away my cart. An elderly man was looking about in a panic. I had seen him
before in the store when I was picking out Sharon fruit and he wanted to know
what kind of fruit it was.
It turned out that he had lost his bag of
groceries. Just put down to clear away the trolley.
97.
My
presumption that one of the clerks had taken the bag to the office, proved
correct. Radiant he appeared moments later with his bag. I had waited for the
results. He said that this was the third time and I warned him not to put down
his messages unattended anywhere. Anyway, I thought I'd go now, good evening
sir. My attitude turned out, in the mall, to make a volcano of misery. He had
been in a Japanese POW camp and was badly beaten. He had never seen his father and mother again. And
when he had found his brother, he also appeared to have died. Terrible, but he
had also been married for more than forty years and also his wife had died five
years ago. He had remarried and his second wife worked very long days so he did
the housework and shopping. A whole life just popped out there. I felt so
terribly small, to see such a man wipe away his tears. I should have left
earlier, but had to do with him. He also had a war pension, and ... Well ...
How do you make something like that loose?
21 November
1992
Today a
Womans Workshop by Women in Peace in Cunera. A long day over the former
Yugoslavia, the war in Bosnia. I had in my workshop a group leader a former Yugoslav. Can you imagine such a
thing.... they can never return. Lived here now for eight years. Family:
Bosnians, Serbs and Croats, both Christians (Orthodox and Catholic) as well as
Muslims. Everyone fought against everyone. Who is not dead or wounded, has
deserted spouse and family. The frenzy of lust, macho men that bring resentment
up thirteen centuries to find alibis for their bloodlust. The male scientists
that sit at the top, not politicians, along with the military, unscrupulous
murderers than anyone else in the world after Hitler. Those men. That anger in
me. I must do something with it.
98.
In the
plenary session an appeal was made to the existing female MPs to accommodate
orphans and children of Serbian raped women in Dutch homes. That made that I,
no microphone, shouted: "And what when those children grow up?" At
first it did not go down well, but later, at the end, when I went to say
goodbye to the chairman jantien Achtseribbe, she revealed that she and Leoni
Spikes had understood me very well. They will try to keep the kids there.
Jantien told me that she was married to a Jewish man (I had my star on) and
understood me. What was somewhere in the back of my mind for a while, I
realized when I was in the rain bringing a few letters to the mailbox.
My father
told me; long ago that Olga had come for the first time to the Netherlands to
find work. I do not know whether she had any qualifications. Maybe she was just
very good at sports, who knows. So she came to The Hague, where a couple had
'hired' her, perhaps as a housekeeper like Olly, or a maid. She therefore came
as "illegal," for economic reasons here.
That night
the "Mr. and Mrs." Said that she must make herself beautiful, because
they would receive visitors. One way or another, she realized that she had not
come to an ordinary house, but a closed brothel and she managed to escape
through a window. She must have already known my father. How? Through a
socialist youth group? Or perhaps through international exchange, so then not
"illegal"? At least she had fled (already) from The Hague to
Amsterdam, to my father or to other members of that group. Shortly thereafter
she became naturalized by marrying my father.
That was on
18 October 1933.
On 1 August
1935 I was born and in the beginning of '36, she must have returned from Vienna
with me. Until autumn and winter 1938, witnessed the photos, in winter clothing
which were taken in Oosterpark or Sarphatipark in Amsterdam.
99.
Between
August '35 and Fall '38 they must therefore have been divorced, when Jaap could
marry in Vienna Hilda. Olly can now write that they did not know whether my
parents were then divorced, but my father certainly was not a bigamist.
Besides, the story is in that regard is clear enough. Moreover, I have a lawyer
and attorney, Plantage Middenlaan 88, in the center of Amsterdam, with a
telephone number. Probably the divorce lawyer from when we were still living in
the Czar Peter Street. So close by.
Another
couple of links to the chain. Or beads on the cord? We are now waiting for the
letter, which has to come from Aunt Olly.
What else do
I need to get past some of letting myself be? Not everything has been worked
out, nor on paper or in my head.
100.
Erica in
Amsterdam
101.
The scrap of
paper from Mr. Cooper
102.
The two
issues from my earliest childhood are still the flight from Vienna to
Amsterdam, and the abrupt divorce of my mother.
From the
time, to the end of the hiding I can figure out the facts, which were a
predominant feeling of darkness and cold. Except for a few sunny memories from
Hoorn. The Martha Foundation, surely in Nieuwersluis has certainly brought
memories above which all the children of that time living in the west of the country must have had. And
besides that also the memories of the
house itself, the garden with its, lightning struck cedar, the lawn by the
pond, where we caught and made frogs 'tame', where we made from reed, skirts.
The owner and
his wife, who returned to their own country seat after the war, I visited
sometime around '85, to seek the past in a first attempt. They were old and
then accused me (!) that we, the children of the war had made a hole in their
hedge and that hedge was never properly mended. That was that. I had no
opportunity to see something of the house or the garden, but a weak cup of
coffee and a biscuit. Very genteel poverty.
Martha
Foundation in Alphen: a lot beatings, punishment and tasks, surviving
unconsciously, belittling and never being the best of the class. In the group I
was the worst and slowest, especially at stopping socks and knitting worsted
stockings. 'Snail' van Beek, apparently no one cared anything about her,
according to stories I heard decades later.
Yet also some
nice memories: I told ghost stories, later, to my peers, when we were in bed
and had to be quiet. I taught them dances and was very creative with beautiful
pieces of material and cardboard and paper, for example, I made diadems for the
hair. The kindergarten, how is it possible, nevertheless it bore its fruit. In
the memories of others I was a very serious, rarely smiling girl.
In my early
memory games pink rubies (or what I mistook thereof) encased in a brooch in the
shape of a bouquet, played a role.
103.
Last week
there was an art and curio market here, striking, especially as art deco
porcelain and old dusty materials evoke nostalgic feelings in me. And by one
stall there was a brooch that did not belong there. Strasz pink rhinestones, a
bouquet with blackened metal and bronze-colored stalks. I loved it; it called a
lot of old, good feelings awake. But it was expensive at fifty guilders. I
lingered at the booth, ostensibly to look at other things. The salesman then
said suddenly, "Good lady, for ten guilders, then." Well, I got it
and am still happy with it, though it is perhaps not even worth the tenner.
Every time I see that brioche, I think of the pink rubies, which I had found as
a child so lovely. I have placed it on the list with my mother’s photo.
Yesterday I
was in a curio shop in Utrecht and for
five guilders I bought a very old book. A
probably first published in Dutch version of the book by
Beecher Stowe: The negerhut. A translation of Uncle Tom's cabin. With the original engravings "to the twentieth
American printing from the English translation." On page 59 the engraving
with Eliza, fleeing across the ice! A publication of the Gebr. E. and M. Cohen, Amsterdam.
24 November
1992
I'm too
impatient and thereby make the receipt of the facts more important than their
processing. Certainly in terms of my own life. I'm still waiting for three
drawn lines:
1. Answer
from Jerusalem;
2 Answer from
London;
3 KRO radio
with Kalien Blondes.
A fourth,
entirely in the background hit point, a new appointment with Margreet about
the Martha - Foundation.
Meanwhile, I
am again eager to take action. In the Platform Modiale Awareness. With an
action for the former Yugoslavia, where
I have plotted the lines. I will convene a meeting to do something on
behalf of AFKIN* and the Federal Food Bond attracts harder: Women Committee,
work group "International Solidarity."
I'm going to
start another book, where I can write about my work now to keep everything in
perspective, only for myself.
Why am I
still doing all this? Why do I not live a good life with my small pension, like
other people? Come on, I know the answer after all. If I was brought up as most
people with the same background, in the safe bosom of a loving family, I was
maybe barely aware of a different world than my little safe world.
It's just my
own traumatic life that has made me aware of and empathetic to the trauma, the
fears, and the world of others. And if I can do something with it, for example
by writing about it, then surely that is a bonus? Even though I sometimes get
the feeling I am found to be a little
crazy, a voice in the wilderness. But if I keep quiet, I feel indeed
responsible. As with writers, journalists, protest singers and artists I have
my own way to express my dismay about the horrors of our time. And maybe too
emotional, but that is the way I happen to be.
26 November
Dorine
called. In the form of Yad Vashem was indeed stated in Hebrew "Olga Bock,
house wife, two children, shot in the street by a German officer because she
did not have her star on. In Amsterdam. Married name and name of parents
unknown. "
Tragically,
so many inaccuracies!
Well, Olly
knew even better than I was saved by nuns! How nameless and unwittingly can a
person live and die! Dear Mutti that after fifty years of your life and death
I can give you a name! Is that not a
miracle?
* The
anti-fascist committee of Nieuwengein
105.
Tonight I
find the courage to call Hedda van Gennep. She confirmed Elmas suspicion that
Olga was alone when she was arrested. And that the Dutch police or the home
front did it. She has seen it happen, that she and her mother were arrested and
her mother was beaten in the street because she was wearing a box for her star.
By Nederlanders- in uniform!
So.... I have
never taken leave or said goodbye. Pfff ... and Mutti was gone.
And then my
daughter Jessica came bye, for a quick cup of coffee.
Hedda gave me
the telephone number of the National Institute for War Documentation. When Olga
was arrested and held prisoner and deported to Westerbork, I can maybe find
something about it there.
Today I
submitted a proposal for the Platform Global Awareness on support actions for
Bosnia. An amount per capita for joint financial operations and public action,
for games, work and labor for the Yugoslav displaced centers. Who are bored
silly, they do not speak our language, sit together and the only distraction
they have is the TV that news from home will bring, in their language. I wonder
if mayor Laan will positively pick this up. That was point 2. Point 1 is
realized on 10 December, and next week, Ad, a good friend, is here with me and
we will work on the content of the magazine Global, the periodical that the platform are going to send out around 15
December.
This weekend to realize point three!
106.
With the 'reconstruction' of my book case I
come again across the white ceramic jar with lid, wherein sits a packed piece
of stone from Auschwitz, that a friend of Renco, my ex-husband, specially
brought for me. That now can get an honorary place.
Will I be
able once again to visit there, as in Vienna, or at Yad Vashem, there to find
my mother's name?
First search
in Westerbrok barracks 41/0.
Bring
telegram.
And fetch the
photo of Olga and me at the photographer.
27 November
1992
The
photograph is collected. The price was 90% better than expected, the print was
disappointing. A bit flat and smooth compared with the yellowed original. Too
bad, but she seems to look younger in it though.
Surprise!
Paul was suddenly in front of me; he came for the second book. It was fine,
again to exchange so many things with him. There remains much old camaraderie.
He has grown and now goes (a little) in depth; even with emotions he dares to
talk about and show a bit. Something where he used to be closed about and a
thunder cloud formed over him, "Life is good, right?" He is a
complete man to be. And so I should prefer him throughout.
We also
talked about the reason for writing. Identity crisis? Yeah, maybe but I had no
feel for my identity. And when we entered into a relationship, he wanted me
holding that identity, gave no meetings or work to be with him. That would
oppress him. No, now I understand that.
What am I
still glad that we can talk and write all about these misunderstandings. Now I
also told him that it was apparently still my nature to efface myself away for
the man I loved. And that was a huge threat to the adventurer who Paul wants to
be.
107.
I thought it
was not so much a question of identity, but also and above all that I no longer
came out after Elma’s book and the conference ‘The hiding child,’ to finally do
and want to know the unwitting and the
unsaid things from the past and from to speak, albeit on paper. This quest for
knowledge and words became the mission of my life. More important to me than
anything I did earlier in my life for that unconscious burden I had to explain.
And previously used to hide behind for intimacy behind a so transparent wall.
Now I can
talk, I can tell Paul all. There's a little sadness, because I could not
before. Now he could understand why I was how I was. But would he though have
coped? I do not think so.
Regarding the
OPK where Elma wrote about: there is a note found in an archive box from the
Martha foundation, which said that the Germans gave permission to take me in at
the Martha foundation. That could, to me it is clear, also have been falsified
by the "resistance", to let me be safe hiding there. Finally there
were more Jewish children.
More research necessary.
30 November
1992
The RIOD *
called. Annemiek van Boxmeer. She has heard the whole story, but already knows
that there is no available data on the way my mother was arrested, the time she
has sat and so forth. All details of the houses of detention in Amsterdam from
the war are now destroyed. This also means that no Dutch police man has become
accountable for his conduct in the war. I will send a letter to Mrs van Boxmeer with all the relevant
information about my mother and she will very carefully look at what data
whatsoever.
*National
Institute for War Documentation
108.
In Westerbrok, she said, are found personal
things of the people that were there. I do not think however that I will find
anything there; she was there only three days.
By RIOD it is maybe also possible to find out how she died: on the
train, on arrival or in the gas chamber. On the note that was found at the Free
University for my inclusion at the Martha foundation: they consider it quite
possible that it was falsified by the resistance. But I have to search that out
at the university.
Moreover, I
am this weekend truly active for society. I have written participation notes
for Wednesday, December 2nd in the ABZ- committee (of Administrative Affairs)
and therefore will speak about the municipal identity card. Moluccans will be
put separately therein. I do not agree to that and just cannot! I will try to stop it.
And there is
a silent vigil scheduled on December 24 because of the smear campaign against
illegal immigrants, where a piece I wrote will appear in the Molenkruier, our house-to-house newspaper.
I have also
already the participate notes in January, the police report will be addressed
in the ABZ- Commisssion. Wow ... now nothing more please.
109.
December
110.
111.
1 December
1992
Yesterday I
talked to Elma. I have found at the
Nieuwengeinse recycling center New Work, two books that I thought would be
something for her. If she, as a journalist, needs for investigations or needs
old newspaper photographs, Our Beautiful Life, 100 years newspaper photographs
(Dutch) and a visual report with newspaper pictures of the great woman strike
on 8 March '81 may be useful. She is, I believe, happy with them. Next week I
will bring them.
Elma said something that has stuck: I would
have to look Olly up in London personally. I can still do that, but I feel a
threshold. In a letter I can confront her with the past, but can I do that in
person? And then, I would see it as climbing a mountain. The night before I
dreamed of her and saw her as an old lady suffering with swollen legs. She is
no longer so hardy, she needs time. To write back. So I interpreted the dream
for myself.
I have
gotten from New Work also a book of
Meyer Sluyser that I did not yet have :
There is growing grass in Weesperstraat and Leonard de Vries: Chaverien, is that a children's book?
I will hear
from Dorine if the library of the JMW (Jewish Social Work) has interest in
them. No mail from abroad.
3 December
1992
For a few
days I'm overly nervous again. Not just because of the participation in the
evening yesterday ABZ * - commission over the identity card of the Dutch
Municipalities. I was sure of my case and have also been vindicated. That card
is not, at least for now, going ahead!
* General
Administrative Affairs
112.
Where from then? Afraid because I go against
the established order? Mayor Laan personally assured me about that matter. Why
then? The weather, the high moon, the constant low pressure area? Causes that
are mentioned more frequently in the past.
When Flik was
mayor here, I did open my mouth as needed. He took me quite seriously and I had
forgotten that I now have good-will on the city council. But that may not be
the only reason for my stress.
Perhaps
waiting for an answer from London? If that still will come? One reason to
consider sending a postcard about it?
No post from London.
No post from Israel.
8 December
1992
Finally! Post
from London and from Jerusalem!
The last
pieces of the puzzle begin to fall into place. Tomorrow I will tell you
everything. Now just as the overriding emotion when I read the translation of
the registration of Yad Vashem. "I ask you to give the survivor a"
posthumous citizenship "of the state of Israel, the undetachable sign of
solidarity with the Jewish people." She belongs there. I belong there.
Never before have I felt so Jewish. At heart and inseparably attached. Even
though the fact that the only attachment is to the JMW and Dorine, who let me
feel through the years that I belong. With no family, I am more a part than
with my children. Still I belong, with the Jewish people for centuries and until
the end of time.
It became
just too difficult, there were tears.
Mutti, you're
nearly home. Then you may rest in peace
and this task is accomplished. "Ein schon Leich '* is made, a beautiful
funeral. Who knows, I may be I will bring you. And otherwise I will visit you
in Jerusalem at Yad Vashem. It is almost 1993, and since I do not speak Hebrew
nor ever observed the Jewish calendar, I raise my glass of herbal tea and say,
"See you next year in Jerusalem."
113
9 December
1992
Now it will
begin with the letters from Aunt Olly and Rabbi Schachter. I will start with
the second. The first is so difficult, so traumatic, that I have read it bit by
bit. And yet still I collapsed.... Sick with the shock, first with anger, a lot
of grief and rebellion later. I'll be back to the translation, if I can muster
up the strength today.
Later that
day. Rabbi Schachter writes:
Dear Mrs. Van
Beek,
I was on a
visit abroad, hence the delayed response.
I was very
touched by your thoroughness and your desire to correct the registration of the
memoir, while my concern was not to further traumatize and bring you in touch
with family.
I enclose
some forms for you to register your mother and possibly other family. It will
be clear that we cannot destroy completed prior Pages of Testimony, we can add
a memo or note there with a reference to the 'added Pages in 1992, for example,
which will lead to your corrected Pages.
Fill in the
form attached, please; address it to me so that I can add the Red Cross letter
and your letter there when I have received them.
Yours
sincerely,
Rabbi J Schachter '
* Yiddish
114
The form is
filled in; I just need to wait a few days for a small copy of the photograph of
Olga and me to send.
And now,
there is no escape: the letter from Aunt Olly.
Dear Erica,
I wish I
could answer questions, but maybe at my age of 85 I forget a lot, or I did not
know a lot of things when they happened. I'm surprised your father seems to
have known me. I've never met him! Olga was really no more than a colleague of
the "Arbeiter Turn Verrein. She walked to Holland , I believe, before
Hitler's woes began in Vienna? Are you born in Holland? I was so happy to meet
here, Miss Palmer, a lady who wanted to guarantee my parents, Hilda and her two
children! But Hilda preferred to marry Jaap and go to Holland, Instead of
becoming a maid servant like me , and the children arrived with a
Kindertransport 'here and lived with an English couple. It took ten months
before I was given Inge to stay here with my parents and later with me. I do
not know whether Ilse knows these facts, but do not tell her, please.
Another fact
is that Olga BORROWED the jacket with the star pinned from Hilda. It was
Hilda’s cloak! I hope Ilsa and Inge never hear this. Please, let them never
know!
Erica, please
try to forget what has happened. Forget and forgive!!
I admire you
for.....
Furthermore,
I cannot go now.....
So this was
the big secret that has remained hidden for fifty years. Olga had worn Hilda’s
jacket briefly.... and she was gone.
115
And the guilt
and shame later on have assaulted Ilse and me.
Fifty years!
Fifty years straight it was hushed, nobody wanted to talk about my mother with
me, everyone has told me to leave the past alone. Also to Ilse. She would’ give
her mother sorrow ‘by asking questions. No, she would know the secret and maybe
tell me. That shame, guilt, we have carried our whole life, we did not know
what!
That anger
over the fate unknown, but no less felt, has given me and Ilse in our
adulthood, crisis dragged into crisis. How do you translate the moaning, the
pain that is felt in your head to your toes, the flow of adrenaline, which can
destroy your body, into words! Give me those WORDS!!
Hilda had
thus lost her cloak, the cloak that killed my mother, and that fifty years long
has covered everything, even my life.
Tell me how I
translate this literal pain in written sentences and I'll write a book thicker
than Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses and heavier than the Torah and the State
bible together.
How do I make
the story in question to look like something that remains credible for myself?
Here it looks like a bad novel, with fictional personalities. But it's true. It
really happened! This was my life. And that of my mother.
I have to
pick myself back together. And continue to write.
For hours I
postponed it. I have tried everything: telephone calls, including Paul, talked
to Jessica, lounging before the TV, to come to my senses. With Dorine yesterday
I tried to place it in perspective in the context of that time, especially into
perspective...
Same day,
very late. Now I finish the letter of Olly.
116
I admire you
because you have led such a strong, useful life and are still so helpful. That
must have been partly because of your Christian education. *
I have
nothing to forgive Hilda of. After my
visit with Inge to Holland Hilda wanted
Inge and Kurti to live with her,
and Louis, with whom she was not married at the time. He must have been a good,
decent man, that he not only accepted Ilse, but also to take the two children
in. To help her, he even married her. I begged Hilda to be allowed to keep Inge
with me for two years so she could finish her education . Hilda refused that.
In any case, it seems that she gave up the
struggle for the children, including the conflict with the Jewish refugees
commitee that protected the children. And nobody saw or heard anything about it
afterwards .....
Yes, Erica,
the bitter times that you have gone through in your life have made you what you
are now. A brave, compassionate person. Try not to think of the past; enjoy
your still relatively comfortable life
now, as I do. I try not to take note of what is happening around me in the
world (I know that's very selfish, but in my 85 years I have no more fighting
spirit in me). I live with my cat Shelly quite satisfied, waiting for Inge's
weekly letter. I hope that the treatment of Allen (Inge's husband) is helping
to fight his cancer. He recently had an operation and is doing well and
hopefully for quite a long time. Their three daughters live in England, but I
only see Sara occasionally. Kate lives in Sheffield, so quite far away. I
rarely see her. Helen shows no interest in contact with me. I have not seen her
since my eightieth birthday.
Well, dear,
you do well. Do not think too much about what has happened and make the best of
life. All good wishes,
Aunt Olly
* How did she
work that out?
117
Well, all
good spirits, help me! What should I answer the old lady? She means it
apparently so well; all my questions about my mother, she has indeed answered,
as far as she could. The conclusions are indeed my own responsibility.
From the
shock, I write my first spontaneous reaction in fluent German. Afterwards I do
not send it, it was too hard for her.
I shy off,
for the umpteenth time. Go to sleep.
10 September
1992
I put aside
everything today to be well prepared for the establishment of the Platform
Global Awareness. Two weeks ago, I submitted a proposal to give a 'flying
start' to this Platform. Aid to Yugoslavian
displaced persons in the Netherlands and an amount per capita to be
voted by the council, for the large joint fundraising (rural) to Somalia and
Bosnia.
I can cry
now. So I do it. After a little playful opening speech of the mayor, we
continued the meeting. And all official events were treated as the drafting of
an annual plan, joint events, bylaws etc. Nothing came out of the paint.
Participants
walked away. When barely half was over, my proposal was on the agenda. All I
wanted was my name swept underneath the platform and then to the City Council.
Well, you cannot expect in such a situation that the point is also discussed
but equally serious. The next meeting is late January. And then I have to come
up with a concrete proposal. As if this was not practical. And others thought
again that they first had to talk with their supporters about it, while the
Platform is designed precisely to take independent decisions. They have, it is
clear, no idea, what it's like to sit in the war.
118
Oh, next
month the need is still there?! Yes, and the fact that they are there left in
the shelters by us, let down this winter, means nothing. And that belongings
and money will only be available next year (maybe) is less important than a
rich regulatory conduct of meetings. I was so angry and bewildered that I'm
seriously thinking to do the whole action and only in a personal capacity. But
I just cannot physically and mentally. I have even taken on working for a
torchlight vigil on December 24 against xenophobia and smears against refugees.
So this was
the big disappointment today. The leaflet Globally, that this time must be
written exclusively on the Ad control, was again nice. I have written for that
a very small article and controlled and corrected it. On Saturday the
volunteers market and on Tuesday is the AFKIN- meeting.
I know I'm
doing it myself, but I would love to continue to do everything, writing,
mourning and work. Help!
That
participation in the ABZ- committee has been a great success! National
newspapers and the Utrecht’s newspaper wrote about it. Elma was not allowed
to, but did have contact with the
consultative body of Moluccan Welfare and Lilipali from the parliament. That
has raised questions for the minister. The VNG downplayed the case, as
uncertainty of Mayor Laan. I was able to bring him the parliamentary question
and wait for the answer from The Hague.
That's my
life.
But I long to
be again, completely busy with the past, with myself, so that I have written
this all. Hey ... it is with a feeling
that I, in this way have been able to tell about my mother.
The spirit
goes where it will- there for her no time, no distance. She moves in other
dimensions, other people, other times and conditions. Provided that it is
willing to be empathetic.
Here I sit, I
can do nothing else, and who wants to go with me?
119
It could have
happened like this.
It's August,
1942. It is a warm day, threatening to storm. Olga and Erica go to Olga’s
sister Hilda, who has a baby. That is not easy at the time, raising a baby.
Olga has a
star, a Star of David on her dress. She did not have a coat on; it's the height
of summer. If small Erica also wears a star? I do not know.
At the end of
the afternoon the sky darkens, but nevertheless it's not raining yet. Hilda
discovers that she needs something for the baby. Milk? Flour? Or the teat is
broken, or the bottle ....
And Olga
offers to quickly go and get it. Quickly , because it is nearly curfew. Then
there should be no more Jews walking about outside ... because the air is so
threatening she calls to Hilda: " I just put on your coat "and
leaves.
And then she comes upon a Dutch policeman or a
border guard, who sees a yellow star and from that liberty takes hold of this
young and attractive woman. To his pleasure and her terror the star was not
sewn, but pinned. That is for him the reason, that he, under threat with his
gun-there were stories that she had been shot dead on the street, but that was
not true - to arrest her and confine her in prison.
At home
waiting, in increasing panic, Hilda and the little Erica. And as it gets later
Hilda is more certain that Olga has been arrested. Because she did not have the
star sewn on her coat but had fastened it with safety pins.
It takes days
before they are assured. It lasts until September 8 before she receives a note
from Olga herself, who is currently on route from Amsterdam to camp Westerbrok.
Olga tries to encourage her sister even at that time. But on September 10 she
sends from Westerbrok a telegram in panic to Hilda, asking her to send the
"Aryan" papers from her ex-husband, it does not help. The next day,
September 11, she is stowed in the lorry, to Auschwitz, where she is
immediately killed upon arrival.
120
And then she
comes upon a Dutch policeman or a border guard, who sees a yellow star and from
that liberty takes hold of this young and attractive woman. To his pleasure and
her terror the star was not sewn, but pinned. That is for him the reason, that
he, under threat with his gun-there were stories that she had been shot dead on
the street, but that was not true - to arrest her and confine her in prison.
At home
waiting in a great panic, Hilda and the little Erica. And it is getting more
certain that Olga has been picked up. Because she had not sewn on her coat the
star, but had fastened it with safety pins.
It takes days
before they get affirmation. But it is not until September 8 before she
receives a note from Olga herself , who is under way at that time from Amsterdam
to Westerbork. Olga tries to reassure her sister even at that time with
courage. But on September 10 she sends from Westerbrok a panicked telegram to
Hilda, asking her to send the "Aryan" papers from her ex-husband. It
does not help. The next day, September 11, she is stowed in the lorry, to
Auschwitz, where she is immediately killed upon arrival.
120
For Hilda the
nightmare would now have begun. This is irrevocably the last time that Olga can
help her. In fact die for her.
What should
she now do with the little Erica? It is as hard as it is with the baby.
Fortunately, Erica also has a father, an 'Aryan' father still, who, to
complicate the story, at that moment ‘for appearances’ is married to Hilda.
Naturally he is divorced from Erica’s mother. His father, Jack, has a brother
who is recently married. And they want to look after Erica.
But if Olga
does not return- and nobody knows whether she will- it becomes even more
difficult. Erica then suddenly becomes a Jewish child, a risk. And then the
wanderings of the child starts from hiding - to hiding place, until no one
knows anymore and she is back at her aunt and uncle on the sidewalk.
Where is
Erica’s father at that time? It appears
that he is sent to work in Germany until he manages to escape in the summer of
1943. He is "married" with Hilda and according to the Registers and
Population of the town hall they live at the same address, but actually he
lives with his father, Erica’s grandfather.
When he,
after his escape, will look for his daughter and arrives at his sister in law ,
that's just at a moment when they are "beating" Erica (his words,
many years later). After a violent argument he takes his child to his home,
where she has a few wonderful months. The only good time actually in her
childhood, when she became an adult, could fondly look back.
That sister
in law has not let it sit. Jaap show no signs of gratitude that she has been
part of the child's fate, especially since she was still a Jewish child.
Instead, he has quarreled with her, added her reproach and 'just' captured the
child. Calling for revenge? She can, so she turns to someone from the Council
for Child Protection, "because it's inexcusable that such a small girl
grows up by two men, moreover, it is a Jewish child.’’
121
The latter must
have been difficult for the Council for Child Protection, but there is someone
who has signed a letter that the Germans include Erica van Beek at the Martha
Foundation in Alphen aan de Rijn. The
Martha Foundation appears to be ‘started’ in Alphen by the Germans! In
Nieuwersluis some of the children were housed.
On a cold,
wet, dark day in December 1943 is Erica then "safely drilled ' in the
Martha Foundation, where she will remain until she was nineteen.
And Hilda?
Hilda with
her two older children can safely get away from Vienna. She gets the chance to go to England. But she
prefers to let her children go - with a girlfriend - she continue to stay in
Amsterdam.
After the war
she married Louis, after a divorce from Erica’s father. The baby from the beginning
of this story thrives on and has a father and a mother. A second baby, born
during the war, does not survive. Hilda with her child also sat for a while in
Westrbork but knew how to survive.
After 1945
she performs a short struggle with the Jewish Refugee Committee and the OPK,
the War Foster Children Committee, to regain her older children. She may have
tried to get Erica out of the orphanage. That did not work. And failure is
–possibly - based on the fact that she is Erica’s aunt and her stepmother.
Well, the OPK did their own standards and Hilda would have not have coped with
the possibility of raising four children.
Has Hilda
been happy with her memories and her past?
122
Vienna
It must not
have been easy living in Vienna between 1920 and 1933. There was the recession,
unemployment, poverty. There, as well as here. Grandfather, Armin Bock, refugee
from the Czech Republic, had become stateless. Married to the Viennese Joszefa
Karpfen (omama, my grandmother), his two children, daughters Olga and Hilda,
are also stateless. Although Jewish, there is no indication that they were part
of the Jewish community in Vienna. But Grandpapa had, due to the persecution of
Jews fled to the Czech Republic. What did he do for a living? Had he (right)
support when unemployed? Or did the family in the beginning a little capital?
Grandpapa
apparently died young. The family was a
member of the Socialist Workers Party. Especially omama seems to have been
militant in it. The youngest daughter, my mother Olga, was also an enthusiastic
member of the Arbeiter Turn Verein and even later won gold at the Workers'
Olympiad in Budapest.
The single
parent family seems to have been very needy. Reasons why Olga took the decision
to try to find a job in the Netherlands. She came to the Netherlands and found,
except for work and income, a man and later had a child from that marriage.
The eldest
daughter had two children in Vienna. From a relationship with a man she could
not marry?
The story is
complicated.
Hitler's hell
is visible in 1933. In that year, in October, Olga married in Netherlands Jaap
van Beek, not a jew, but a blonde blue-eyed Dutchman. (A few generations back,
one Lady Von Dalmann of German landed gentry, married to a Van Beek, so the
"Aryan" could not be doubted.)
Almost two
years later, from the marriage of Olga and Jaap, a daughter is born, Erica. The
marriage seems to have lasted for a half a year longer. Olga goes back to
Vienna with her baby. It is not known whether Hilda is (still) financially
maintained, nor is it known whether, as the separation between Olga and Jaap is
final, Olga receives alimony. It can be assumed that Olga earns a living for
the family. At that time, Erica is so ill that she is hospitalized in the
children's hospital in Vienna and has a lot of children’s sicknesses
consecutively. Which cannot have been conducive to Olga to keep her job.
After
Kristallnacht not only hell breaks loose in Germany, but the panic among Jewish
citizens in surrounding countries.
Jaap since August
1938 separated from Olga, goes to Vienna and begs Olga remarry him for her and
Erica’s safety. Olga refuses and points out to him that Hilda and her two
children are much more vulnerable. How is Jaap committed to marry Hilda and her
two children for their safety while he still loves Olga? Olga is a strong
personality, an athlete at heart, much stronger than Jaap and Hilda together.
Olga goes
with Erica and Omama 'on vacation' and when they come back, Jaap, Hilda and the
two children have left Vienna. That must have happened in the summer of 1939.
Aunt Olly
Weiss
As said Olga
was a member of the Arbeiters Turn Verein. In the same building where she lived
with her family, also the Weiss family lived. And the family loved the little
children of Hilda, especially the eldest daughter Inge. Olly Weiss was Olga’s
team mate.
Olly sought
and found work as a housekeeper or maid in London. She also wanted her parents
to come and Hilda with her two children. She was lucky to find one Miss Palmer,
a wealthy lady who wanted to guarantee both the family Weiss and Hilda. This
event took place in the course of 1938. In '39 all was arranged.
But when push
came to shove, in other words, when Olly went to Vienna to pick them up, Hilda
now turned out to be married to Jaap. Rather than be a maid in England and take
care of her children, she went to Amsterdam with Jaap. While her children, with
a 'children's transport' travelled to London. After being there for ten months,
Inge went to live with the Weiss family,
where, after the death of Olly’s parents was raised by Olly herself. Her
brother Kurti was raised up by foster parents. Both children remained in
England, becoming adults and received British citizenship.
124
Hilda’s third
child, Ilse who was born in the
Netherlands, stayed with her. It was after the war, so she got a (step) father,
grew up prosperously , but not without trauma as the second generation child.
And was actually an only child.
The war also
seems to have been for her parents an indigestible matter and when the daughter
was mature they decided to separate. Not long after that Hilda died, she was
burned out.
13 December
1992
I am sitting
with my feelings back in the war times. For a few days now. Has nothing changed
in fifty years? The realization that the Platform, so Nieuwengein then , now
refuses to do something about the misery of the displaced-shelters in the form
of some distraction, or to advise B & W on a contribution per capita for
Bosnia ( where a hunger winter of '44
is on the way!) and Somalia .... Here
nothing can be done, knowing how it is makes me so desperate that I cannot
sleep and can think of nothing else all day. Although yesterday I have been at
the stand of Novib at the voluntary market all day with a friendly face.
You know, you
can only talk to people who know what you're talking about.
I am glad
that the action against xenophobia, against illegal smear campaign, comes in
order. Peter has created posters for the twenty-fourth. Women for Peace and
Amnesty participate.
125
So I can channel
my grief and my anger without damaging myself.
Sadness and
anger are not gone, oh no.
I want to go
back to December 9, the letters.
I will tell
Rabbi Schachter the story briefly, why I am so determined to straighten out the
Pages. Does he not see it himself, that it is not a remembrance of my mother,
but the desire of my niece to have the name of her family member in this?
N'importe
what kind of data? Not one syllable of it was correct, except the name. My
first feeling was therefore, that the Rabbi, felt a little passed over ,
because I did not respond to the discovery of the niece, who also knew nothing.
But that is not what I was looking for, I must make it clear. Reparation for
Olga, of whose life and death only Hilda knew about and who kept silent from
me. That mantle of fifty years that was revealed by Olly, with instructions
never to let Ilse and Inge know. I want that also in the Pages. I will have to
let Ilse know of that letter. How? I'll have to think, well that's no rush.
Other things
remind Olly that she no longer can place. But concerned about that time, she is
still, though she says that she does not have any "fight" more with
her 85 years.
That means
that she had in that in the past, and that shows. The courage not only for
herself but also for others to find a safe haven, speaks from her letters. It
is a pity, a great pity that Inge and Kurti that I should have known so well in
Vienna have disappeared completely from sight. Actually just like Ilse. A
family band will I never have with them again, but it's nice that I have heard
about them again.
Over the
acceptance of ‘that coat ‘I am still not there, even if I put it in
perspective. How do you do that as a victim? I can say, Hilda, I forgive you;
the fact itself is your underestimation of the danger of your carelessness.
That is something that happens.
126
But it did
have my mother killed, as you ought to have been wearing that coat. And as you
have survived (but how?), so she could
have survived. She would have taken Ilse , combative as she was. Now my
life has given Ilse a home, but apparently not a happy childhood. Let me hold
on to that. Ilse has also become a war victim, her "home." And my
life has consisted of flights from nowhere to nowhere, me closing my past until
now. Here only I have found my home. Only after three children and two
marriages. My oldest lost through drugs and suicide-no mother who could reach
him, he was imprisoned in himself.
Jacob, my
child that hid under a coat until he suffocated. From a fear of living.
Leo, who is
alone and that maybe will remain that way, grew up with me and two fathers
could not be real fathers.
Jessica, who
is still fighting for freedom under that coat, which she now knows, exists.
I myself,
that I no longer dare to venture into a new relationship, after making wrong
choices five times. Thanks for the one who taught me to sublimate my anger and
grief into action for people, who like me suffered from oppression and
infringements of his human dignity, proclaiming rights for the incapacitated!
Is that the
key to my whole life after Olga? Oppression and disregard for my human dignity?
Finally, I was Jewish and, as such, was I- treated in the time when I lived. I
see now. And I have acted in the past twelve years, but for recognition of my
person and to restore my dignity
From my
empathy with those, and for those that I I worked with, from what I have
experienced myself.
But also of
anger and sadness, which could not be captured in words, because I kept the
cargo from the past denied until now.
127
15 December
1992
What is -and
what is the function of -a prophet?
Pastor Mook called me, ‘The prophetess of
Nieuwegein. ‘ That has lingered.
Tonight
council meeting . In the break I was talking to J.H. He told me
enthusiastically about the worries of preparing for Christmas. And I told him
that I was not able to celebrate Christmas this year. What happens so close
east of our borders. With Bosnia and images of Somalia.
Another
councilor said later, "You did not come to make us sad, huh Erica?”
What should I
do? Stay talking in the form of politeness? I may not express my feelings, my
sorrow and anger and impotence in order not to disrupt the Christmas party? May
I not indicate that we cannot celebrate with a clear conscience and cheerful
mood while such terrible inhuman things happen this Christmas season?
Did Reverend
Mook mean that I am a thistle under foot? Or (calamity) prophet who disturbs
the peace of the conscience of Christians and non Christians?
We, war children and adults know, yet have still
all experienced at firsthand? And yet are still scared, angry, helpless and
almost powerless? Almost, because only a small area, we cannot get involved to
resist the immense indifference, the ‘cocoon’. Pull that screen, that wall
you've built around you and just see what happens around us. Let's work
together to try there to change that. It is not for us, then for our children
and grandchildren. So that the blood on our hands of our indifference does not
come upon our descendants. Then we will be certainly guilty. Omama, as weak as
you were, you were a militant woman who meant a lot for the labor movement.
Mutti, the
strength of your character, your perseverance and sportsmanship, your living
will to start a new life here, with all the menace of Hitler Germany. Give me
some of your perseverance, despite all resistance. I'm so discouraged now.
128.
Who wants to
hear
Those who
wish to see
Who suffers
too
Not just with
me
But with the
horror
Where people
like them
Should survive them
or die?
I did not ask
for, nor can I shut myself away from it.
My
powerlessness over my past blends seamlessly into despair about the horrors of
today.
I thought I
could get away now, but every time that it takes longer, I am more a part of
them. I hear them, right here in my safe little flat I'm not safe there.
L’histoire interieure se repete toujours; comme l'exterieur. Et parce que cette
histoire d'aujourd'hui est l'exterior. Et parce que cette histoire
d'aujourd'hui est l'histoire de moi-meme et de Maman et Omaman et six miliones
des autres hommes. Et il passe aujourd'hui, après cinquantes années.
Now back in
French, earlier to Olly in German. What comes up as I write this?
Say, write
what I know, what I feel. And make people participants of what happens ,
whether they like it or not.
The coat has
to go.
I fight and
wrestle with all these feelings, day and night. Sometimes it's sadness so great
that I have no spoken words, and if I find them, because of the interests of
others, my mouth takes over, without being able to stop it.
Is this the
function of a prophet?
Or do I behave like an intrusive campaigner?
No, that is
not me. But maybe they see me like that, if I do not keep my feelings under
control and thus contact others in their heart and conscience.
I do this
more than ten years-over declared unfit for work (sick and disabled), over
racism versus equality. If it would leave me indifferent, I would have no need
to write about it or talk about it. Sometimes they give me the feeling that
they think I am mad.
So be it.
This is me, Erica, made up of a life that was dominated by an invisible and
unknown coat of fifty years now. Exponent of "lest we forget."
129.
16 December
1992
I just read
Ilse’s letter of 14 November again, where she tries to untangle the knot that
has occured upon completion of Rivka’s addition to The Page. The history of Olga and Hilda were
jumbled. This could imply that Hilda has also told Rivka facts - the jacket-
and Rivka has therefore become confused,
that is the misunderstanding . I try now
to put it in the time. Everyone was still busy processing, or stopping of the
flaring memories of the horrors. We were traumatized, and could not put into
words what kept us so busy. Maybe Hilda has told her story confusingly, which
was picked up as such. But when she wrote a letter about it, not only Olly knew
it, but Rivka knew then - and Ilse also now!
1.How do I
tell Ilse?
2.How can I
tell that to Aunt Olly?
Oh time, get
me in that matter!
Kalien
Blonden called. Relief: the radio programme is off. The editors did not think
it a good opportunity.
I let on to
her surprise that I find it fine,because
the only reason I had agreed, lay in the search for survivors, who would have
known her. That is now no longer necessary. Thence.
130.
130.
The last data
is now coming in and the next week I hope, if not the real grieving process,
yet will I finish this book.
In the last
few days, there were quite a few things that ran together, so it was difficult
to stay with this case. So emotional, I could not sleep and really collapsed
yesterday. (And promptly at half past three in the afternoon I slept until
eight o'clock this morning, with some interruptions!)
Why my
emotions with me went on the run?
Among other
things because I cannot handle that people very carelessly spend millions and millions on Christmas shopping,
chunky tables, feasting, while just over our border and further, into former
Yugoslavia, history is being repeated. The same history, which I'm trying to
deal with in this book. Shut up, Erica, don’t make us sad, and do not appeal to
us and our consciences. Don’t you see that we want to celebrate, you disturber!
Judging by
the signals I expected Thursday, December 24th not a big turnout for the torch
vigil, we organized as AFKIN.
Yesterday I again
brought out in the library, the Jewish Weekly News. Searching for clues that
maybe I had previously overlooked. In the Jewish Weekly News, number 20 of
August 21, 1942, I found an article on the confirmation of the star.
131.
Serious warning
The presidents
of Amsterdam’s Jewish Council make further emphasis for Amsterdam's attention
to the obligation of Jews to:
1st to
properly attach the Star of David and wear it visibly;
2nd refrain
from entering gardens, parks and all the roads that are forbidden for Jews;
3rd not use
traffic ways without a license;
4th not live
or stay at other addresses than the above address mentioned on the identity
card.
Violation of
these provisions has led in several cases to severe punishment, even when it
was solely due to carelessness. Hence the repeated serious warning.
It is conceivable that Hilda has even tried to
get help from the Jewish Council, or at least tried to get to the Council for
information when Olga was not coming home. Maybe she told them that Olga was
wearing her coat. But nothing helped. This remains hypotheses, but I cannot
imagine differently.
21 December
1992
Today I
received this letter from the RIOD:
Dear Mrs van
Beek,
In response
to your letter of 2 December 1992, I can tell you the following:
The
collections of the RIOD contain unfortunately no more details about your mother
Olga Bock then you are already familiar with. For example, there are no
documents that have been preserved, which relate to the arrest of your mother.
132
THE JAILS
ADMINISTRATION HAS NOT BEEN RECOVERED
AFTER THE WAR*
Of the
documents relating to the Westerbork transit camp, the proof is that Olga Bock
was indeed deported on 11 September 1942.
I would have
liked to have done more for you. I'm sorry, that by the limitedness of the
material at my disposal, it is not possible.
Sincerely, Ms
A van Boxmeer.
Where can I
still go with my anger and sadness? Is there a policeman ever punished for the
preparation of murdering my innocent mother? A driver for obediently bringing
her to her place of execution?
And today
happens again the same! Are people because of their origin, their religion,
massively persecuted their appearance, killed, expelled, put to flight. And
survivors should only see them ready to come out.
Okay, okay,
it's all happened fifty years ago and I am only now so far, I can handle it a
little, to relive that time for myself.
Yet it is too
much for me, as before, the same things are happening. My empathy should not be
stretched too far!
All and
sundry of the Dutch tribe celebrates rather extensive Christmas. So I
don’t need to .
*Capitals are
mine
133
23 December
1992
It brought to
mind again the note of Olga. There is no trace of reproach to Hilda . Instead,
she tries yet to speak to Hilda with courage, "Kopf hoch, Madel."
History does
not change its view. Never has there been a ‘point of return’. Who am I, that I
look back with so much anger and resentment at a time, which cannot be compared
with this time, in this society, in this same country? And, I have the examples that today terrible things happen
with and through people.
May a man
fail? Weak and maybe a coward, if he should suffer such intolerable tension, as
at that time? With, still, the examples of Germany and now in Yugoslavia.
130.
The last data
is now coming in and the next week I hope, if not the real grieving process,
yet will I finish this book.
In the last
few days, there were quite a few things that ran together, so it was difficult
to stay with this case. So emotional, I could not sleep and really collapsed
yesterday. (And promptly at half past three in the afternoon I slept until
eight o'clock this morning, with some interruptions!)
Why my
emotions with me went on the run?
Among other
things because I cannot handle that people very carelessly spend millions and millions on Christmas shopping,
chunky tables, feasting, while just over our border and further, into former
Yugoslavia, history is being repeated. The same history, which I'm trying to
deal with in this book. Shut up, Erica, don’t make us sad, and do not appeal to
us and our consciences. Don’t you see that we want to celebrate, you disturber!
Judging by
the signals I expected Thursday, December 24th not a big turnout for the torch
vigil, we organized as AFKIN.
Yesterday I
again brought out in the library, the Jewish Weekly News. Searching for clues
that maybe I had previously overlooked. In the Jewish Weekly News, number 20 of
August 21, 1942, I found an article on the confirmation of the star.
131.
Serious warning
The
presidents of Amsterdam’s Jewish Council make further emphasis for Amsterdam's
attention to the obligation of Jews to:
1st to
properly attach the Star of David and wear it visibly;
2nd refrain
from entering gardens, parks and all the roads that are forbidden for Jews;
3rd not use
traffic ways without a license;
4th not live
or stay at other addresses than the above address mentioned on the identity
card.
Violation of
these provisions has led in several cases to severe punishment, even when it
was solely due to carelessness. Hence the repeated serious warning.
It is conceivable that Hilda has even tried to
get help from the Jewish Council, or at least tried to get to the Council for
information when Olga was not coming home. Maybe she told them that Olga was
wearing her coat. But nothing helped. This remains hypotheses, but I cannot
imagine differently.
21 December
1992
Today I
received this letter from the RIOD:
Dear Mrs van
Beek,
In response
to your letter of 2 December 1992, I can tell you the following:
The
collections of the RIOD contain unfortunately no more details about your mother
Olga Bock then you are already familiar with. For example, there are no
documents that have been preserved, which relate to the arrest of your mother.
132
THE JAILS
ADMINISTRATION HAS NOT BEEN RECOVERED
AFTER THE WAR*
Of the
documents relating to the Westerbork transit camp, the proof is that Olga Bock
was indeed deported on 11 September 1942.
I would have
liked to have done more for you. I'm sorry, that by the limitedness of the
material at my disposal, it is not possible.
Sincerely, Ms
A van Boxmeer.
Where can I
still go with my anger and sadness? Is there a policeman ever punished for the
preparation of murdering my innocent mother? A driver for obediently bringing
her to her place of execution?
And today
happens again the same! Are people because of their origin, their religion,
massively persecuted their appearance, killed, expelled, put to flight. And
survivors should only see them ready to come out.
Okay, okay,
it's all happened fifty years ago and I am only now so far, I can handle it a
little, to relive that time for myself.
Yet it is too
much for me, as before, the same things are happening. My empathy should not be
stretched too far!
All and
sundry of the Dutch tribe celebrates rather extensive Christmas. So I
don’t need to .
*Capitals are
mine
133
23 December
1992
It brought to
mind again the note of Olga. There is no trace of reproach to Hilda. Instead,
she tries to speak to Hilda with courage, "Kopf hoch, Madel."
History does
not change itself. Never has there been a point of return. “Who am I that I
look back with so much anger and resentment at a time, which cannot be compared
with this time, in this society, in this same country? And, I see through
examples today that terrible things happen with and through people.
May a man
fail? Weak and maybe a coward if he should suffer such intolerable tension, as
at that time? With, still, the examples of Yugoslavia and now in Germany?
Hilda,
Whatever have
been the consequences of the 'coat', who am I, that I would condemn. If I have
to forgive anything, I do hereby wholeheartedly!
It apparently
had .
And if
not, then we have to accept that life is as it is and I am that I am. Do not
look back at what might have been if ....
And I want to
see in advance what is possible. What good things I can still contribute. So
what happened and what is presently happening east of our borders, will perhaps
not go repeating itself...
Over that and
this way I will have to write back to Olly and Ilse.
And I will.
I have
searched for my mother and found her. Even though I did not know how I would
find her, I knew that I had never taken leave of her. I did that now. And I may
mourn a youth that I and hundreds of thousands, even millions of children that
were taken away by the madness of power forces, who use the power they have to
create people that are immersed in grief, because they differ in color and
origin from what they propose as normal.
134
This is the
letter I wrote to Rabbi Schachter:
22 December
1992
Dear Rabbi
Schachter,
It took me a
few days before I was able to write back.
I would first
like to thank you again for your concern of my wellbeing.
Enclosed you
will find the new Page of my mother with a picture of her and me as a child.
Thank you that you want to take care of her file.
I want to
tell you again, so that no misunderstanding exists, I had to research the past
of my mother and me. I had no evidence that she ever existed, except this
picture and some papers, when in a short time two things happened. The book of
Elma Verhey "To the Jewish Child” was released and the conference “The
Hiding Child “, became public. I not only survived almost without memories, but
also with fear and anger that I did not understand.
I had to make
this quest. Not only for me but also for my daughter Jessica, a
second-generation child, so she and her mother will understand themselves
better and also to give her a past.
I've told you
about my two sons, one of them died by suicide, by deliberately taking an
overdose of pills and drugs. That has to do with my past. And the second son
has his difficulties through that.
And there was
another, important reason and that was to give a grave with her own name to my
mother. So she was no longer an unknown and unnamed victim.
135
I never
sought nor wanted relatives. Anyone who has survived, that knew of my
existence, never let that be known. Not even shown of their existence. I say
this not with anger or self-pity. But there is no room for them. I have my own
life, my (former) family, my friends and my work. With the latter I mean, I
(still) want to believe in the 'Global Village' and our shared responsibility
there-for. So I see my daily volunteer work. Here I have found my family and
friends. Believe me, I have no bitterness.
I found my mother. And my own past.
At the same
time I have lost my fear of my memories. And thus so many remembrances have
come back. Not all, the most traumatic still remain hidden.
I have among
other things discovered that my mother was arrested and thrown in prison and
later via Wester Bork in Auschwitz is murdered, that the coat she was wearing
at the time, with the pinned-star, was the coat of her sister. She probably
borrowed it to get something quickly for her sister’s baby. .and did not
return. And sister survived and has not looked back at me.
That makes
this discovery very difficult to process. Do you understand?
The whole
story of my quest, now by friend Paul typed and edited. I will keep my promise
and send you a copy. That is if the book is finished. If it is published.
A miserable
side effect is that this quest is taking place at a time when all that misery
in Germany and the former Yugoslavia is now happening. Where the Serbs are
doing the same things against non-Serbs, especially against Muslims. It is very
frightening to believe that humanity will never change, no matter how big the
technical progress and the communication possibilities for humanity nowadays
have become. On the contrary, it seems that we just want to use it to destroy
ourselves and the world. There was a time, not so long ago; I had the idea that
humanity was becoming better and wiser.
Well, I'm
wiser ... and sadder.
136
Regarding my
Israel I had the hope that the war with the Palestinians would come to an end
with election of the Labour Party. But there is still no sign of peace. On the
contrary, the PLO and Hamas will work together and I'm terrified for such
cooperation.
Judaism and
Peace.... will it ever go together?
Last I read
in a newspaper a statement by a Serbian word carrier: "War makes sense as
long as there is a possibility to make a profit." Is that not cynical? Put
the word 'peace' in place of 'war' and we can have the most delicious world.
And then of course an all-out ban and
closing of all weapons factories because
they destroy our world and kill our children, our fathers and mothers.
But these are
simply philosophical thoughts of mine. I expect no one, to make this a reality.
I'm going to
leave you. Thanks for everything you've done for me. Receive my best wishes for
yourself. Forever,
Yours
sincerely,
Your Erica
van Beek.
37
24 December
1992
A while ago I
wrote: "In the past is the present, in the moment what is coming." A
cliché, but how true!
The hatred is
now grown by supra-nationalism and social discontent is the seed where fertile
soil is found in the victims of today and future generations. The raped women
of Bosnia bring forth children who are already hated for their birth.
The fruits
thereof may be new wars again, in about 25, 50 or 100 years.
Tribal strife,
religious wars, they are now and always will be. Because we are only human,
obstinate and unruly.
And all
surviving victims will be able to write books like this ...
Peace on
earth is a dream, we have to face the truth.
Maybe that is
the lesson I had to learn and if necessary why I had to write this book.
The
"Global Village," which I dream of is the dream of a relatively small
group of people. With little power. And our world will continue to run maybe a
little longer. But will they survive?
To believe in
it, I would have to rely on the fundamental goodness of people. The fundamental
sense of responsibility for each other as human beings. The I = you feeling.
And I must
begin with myself.
Sigh..... I'm
not there yet.
39
Jood
141
January 29,
1993
Finally I
have written draft letters to Olly and Ilse. Maybe I can finish them Sunday and
send them. The text I want in any case to record here.
Dear aunt
Olly,
It took me a
long time to learn to live with what is written in your last letter. The
thought that Olga had the coat on of Hilda was very hard to bear. It is even
reflected in the title of the book about my childhood, that will be called Two
women and a coat.
Now the time
is ripe, now I am able to live with it, as with everything that has happened.
The period
from 1939 to May 1945 was on the Continent a time of incomprehensible terrible
events. Where the people who survived were injured for the rest of their lives.
Hilda was also briefly in the
concentration camp Westerbork, together with Ilse who was a baby.
I am
convinced that Hilda has gone to the Jewish Council in Amsterdam when Olga did
not return. And she told them what has happened. I am so confident because I
read in the Jewish Weekly from a few weeks later an article warning people
extra not to pin the star, but to sew it on: "Several people that are
pinning have been severely punished.” What I would have to forgive Hilda of, I
have forgiven her.
142
As you said,
life has not exactly been kind to me, but Hilda had to live with her grief and
her anger, and get on with her life. What's maybe never really happened, to
which maybe she was not able to.
I tell you
(including myself) once again: life is as it is. I've learned to accept that.
It is
possible that Olga on that (rainy!) day in August '42 put on Hilda’s jacket
just to get something quickly for the baby, and she was arrested (and taken to
jail and later to Westerbork etc.) almost as soon as she came out on the streets. Her face was so
truly Jewish, that I doubt that, even if for her a hiding place was available,
that she might have survived.
Therefore, I
cannot understand how Ilse, Inge and Kurti could know nothing about it, even
after Hilda and Louis died. It was still not intentional Hilda; it was
carelessness, with incalculable consequences.
I have
decided to send a copy of your letter to Ilse. Maybe that's a consolation to
her. She is still with sadness and anger from the past. There were so many, too
many things that she could not understand. So much that she was unable to go to
the conference Hidden Children.
Can you
imagine what war does with small children? Even those events that you cannot
understand, that feeling of "I could have better not have been born,"
which remains always. That entire trauma, your whole life. Until you have learned
to find words for and to use those words for yourself. This is done usually not
before your fiftieth birthday. And then the past, has long since used or deformed your character. And your
life decides. The fears and anger have become a part of you. How do you deal
with that? That is for an outsider very difficult to understand.
Life has also
not been easy for you, I suppose. But you, your family and the children were
not hunted in England as wild animals such as Jewish people in the Netherlands.
You were pretty safe there.
Do you
understand, there is no more reproach. To anyone. It all happened. As it is
happening in Yugoslavia. We never expected that it could all happen again. But
it does!
143
Dear aunt
Olly,
I have now
also been able to give my mother a funeral. In Jerusalem, at Yad Vashem in the
Hall of Names. And my whole childhood became memories to me.
That was the
purpose of the quest and no less for my life that now has to continue, more
than ever. The whole has to be a book that is worth reading.
I send you my
love and greetings and thank you for your help.
Hoping again
to receive a letter from you,
Your Erica.
Dear Ilse,
It has taken
a long time before I could process what I came to know about the past. Like so
many Jewish people, I have processed it- with a friend in this case in a book,
which will hopefully be released.
It is much, very much, that has become clear.
Also regarding aunt Olly’s feelings towards your mother. Do you want me to tell
you everything or would you rather just read my last letter to Aunt Olly? You
can also wait for the book. The title is Two women and a jacket.
Only
now am I able to discuss with you anything you want to know. Your sadness and
anger have become clearer to me. As for me, I have now learned to accept life and
let go of the past now that I have found words to describe it. That is also
thanks to you.
We cannot
change the past.
144
I'm now
finished with it all. And I hope you find the courage to do so too. Maybe my
letter to Olly will help you with that. Otherwise I will let you know when the
book comes out.
Do not
hesitate to write me, call or visit, if you have questions to ask. I have now a
different perspective than 'then'.
I hear from
you?
Yours Erica
These letters
I now send as soon as possible.
145
February
146
147
28 February
1993
Letter
received from Aunt Olly, which made me very distressed. Of course she's right.
But Elma and Paul found it too: Now I turn and I should be able to let it
sink a while.
Here's the
letter.
Dear Erica,
This time, I
find it hard to answer your letter. But first, I wish you luck with your book.
I had no idea you were a writer. But you have abused my trust. When I told you
about that incident with Hilda’s jacket I prompted you not to tell Ilse.
Finally, it was her mother's fault that may have led to Olga’s death, even if
it was indirect. Now it is in your book and Ilse will read it and she could
tell Inge. You cannot tell me that it was necessary to make their memory of
their mother worse.
I can only
hope that Ilse will not be too much affected.
Maybe it can
be prevented that Inge will know. She has enough to worry about with her
husband's illness. In any case, I do not think Inge suffers from her memories
of that time, because she and I only know of the events through other people.
Our only concerns were the war cases, we Jewish people, even strangers, were
treated the same as the English themselves.
I only hope
that now you are able to put the past behind you.
Best wishes,
Aunt Olly
148
Of course her
trust is, in terms of the jacket, ashamed. But how do I make it clear that I
did not just think that was precisely the point where everything revolved
around? For fifty years, my mother is dead in silence out of shame about it. Is
it not time that it is written, spoken and processed? Out of concern for them,
the now adult children of Hilda, I may panic again, keep my mouth shut, I feel
guilty for events in which I have had some part. I became the victim, not her.
Apparently
she was so angry (or confused) that she could not place the name on the
envelope accurately.
149
March
151
12 March 1993
Visit to
Westerbork. Search for Barak 41.0.
At five past
eight Jessica and I met at station Batau-north in Nieuwegein. The train to
Amersfoort at 8:44 we reached easily and we got there at just after nine. A
terrible station. With that in Apeldoorn, I think, one of the worst of the
Netherlands. A type of aircraft thoroughfare that comes out in Amersfoort-Never
land. It took a while before we could orientate and we even had to ask the way
to the Amersfoort station, where we should wait for Dorine to ride together in
her car to Westerbork.
The weather
gods had the first day of spring and made that the trip became an almost
festive experience. Despite the gray tones that marked the destination.
Just before
Hooghalen we decided to eat coffee with a treat. But it was only to get a
sandwich on stale bread.
The parking
lot of the Remembrance Centre in Westerbork lay still in the early afternoon.
And when we got out the full gravity of our goal fell like a gray blanket over
us.
Inside, in
the open lobby with visitor reception, the almost sacred atmosphere was
shattered by a whining barking dog. Moments later, the sound of Christmas songs
....nota bene, belong to a video film further on.
The
exhibition is almost complete. Only my mother was, also here, not to be found
in any picture, in any film. She was here as well? All the daily and weekly
horrors. More than sixty thousand people, including Olga my mother lived here
for a longer or shorter time before they were transported for slaughter in
cattle trucks.
152
It's all
displayed there, with matching sounds. Only missing the smell of fear.
At the end of
the exhibition, I was surprised by the fragment of a poem by Leo Vroman:
Come this
evening with stories
How the war
is gone...
And they
repeat a thousand times
All the times
I will weep
That was too
much. Internally I was at that time a lost, screaming and frantic child
appearing as usual, I think. Very controlled. Jessica and Dorine were not done
yet. But I could no longer see clearly.
Later,
outside, the worst point of pressure of the boiler could be taken. Through an
emotional spot, tears: "That poem of Vroman that they should have left
out...." Nonsense, of course. It hung there not for me. But it was the straw
that broke the camel’s back.
Walking
through the forest of the Observatory we tried to reach the Memorial Field ,
the former camp. I was actually secretly glad that we were a bit lost. The
final over tired body did during that seemingly endless walk make my emotions
fly away. At one point I heard and saw again and I could hear birds enjoy a day
out in the first warm rays of the year.
We reached a
crossroads. Where was the Memorial Field? Left? Right?
We decided to
go left.Mistake. An endless road without any traffic. Until finally a boy
approached with a transport container behind his bike and revealed to us the
secret of this traffic-free road.
Dorine had
wanted to pick up the car in order to go to the
Memorial Field . But here, on the site of the Observatory , whereby this
road also belongs cars may not drive. Because it causes interference in the
reception of space signals. Later we would be on the field, and perceive for
ourselves the enormous steadily rotating satellite dishes.
153
There was nothing
to do but continue to walk back and by the Memorial Centre , step on the bus to
the field. A bit of a bad feeling for me, because I was at the first
confrontation with the bus chauffeur several hours before quite emotional about
the sign on the front of the bus 'Kamp
Westerbork' in large letters. Did that now may not be: former Kamp Westerbork?
Or Memorial Field Westerbork? He responded quite shocked, he had never thought
about it. The driver was a nice guy who even picked us up again.
And the sun
kept its profusion spreading above us.
The Memorial
Field is only recognizable as ‘Camp
Westerbrok’ through the eyes of the mind. That means that on this radiant day,
close your eyes and try to imagine that every slight rise in the ground was a
barracks or a house, the roads were muddy pools, the air was cold and menacing.
And where there now is a floor in the area, the locomotive was with cattle cars
behind it. Dark, wet, cold. Screaming, crying, fear of death. Animal apathy
too. Human survival instinct in all shapes, smells of fear, impoverishment and
damp peat.... But also superhuman courage and optimism against their better
judgment.
We searched for Barrack No. 41-0, where
my mother had stayed, but there was not
before every barrack a mushroom with a
number. We dwelt at length on the former apple instead. For every Jew an
asterisk for each Shinti or Roma (Gypsy is still a nickname) a fire. An English
boy picked up a loose star to take it as a souvenir. "You shouldnt do
that," I said and he obediently put the star back on a stone. For how
long?
Walking along the ancient monument of the bent
rails, along the paths and fences, along the partially intact kept ruins of
barracks, my courage sank in shoes. Would I find the place where- about -Olga
had been? Along the way I picked up a piece of debris on gray cement with
pebbles from the side of the road. Something from the bottom, the base of the
former barracks. It has been given a place with just such a piece of debris
from Auschwitz, at home in a ceramic pot.
Then, with
the exit in sight and already standing bus, Jessica screamed. ‘Forty-one!! '
Dorine and I reacted sluggishly, for we had not expected it. ‘Ma, Dorine,
please look: Barak 41.’
From a huge
sense of relief that there was yet again a proof of her existence, I looked at
Jessica and Dorine to the mushroom which indicated that this was a house in a
long line. Did it mean that she ended up with friends or acquaintances? The
panic, which she must have known during the three days she was here? Immediately
afterwards I realized that I'm here, as her daughter and standing with her
granddaughter and my good friend, after fifty years, to bring her a final
tribute. As at a funeral. This is where I spent my last salute. That is so
Erica That I had to grin in spite of myself. My dead loved ones live in my
heart that was never tied to one place. But the relief to have laid the last
piece of the puzzle in place, having finished the quest, was great. I kept
grinning. Jessica was delighted that it was she who found the place, Dorine was
happy for me.
The purpose
of the journey was found. And in the van to the center I told elated to the
astonishment of the other occupants, ‘I have found again the place of my
mother’
The return
trip to the West was quick. And the thread to the past snapped when we were
tired and hungry and could find no place to recuperate, to get something before
we had to take the long journey home. Dorine decided to drive to Amsterdam. She
put Jessica and myself out at staion Amersfoort. Her children were too long
waiting for her, it was getting late.
My daughter
and I decided to first eat in ’The Old Tram 'opposite the station.
155
The waiter
was a friendly young flatter . The food was not even reasonable. Then he asked
in clearing if it had tasted, I could not help saying that the meat had been
too long in the fat, because the steak did
not taste good.
The train was
ready. Only in Hilversum, we discovered that we had taken the wrong train.
157
September 2,
1994
To create a
book, that was actually not what it was about. When the need was there, Erica
wanted to force in herself a breakthrough. Writing was just a tool. Has it done
her good?
"I can
now talk about myself, not as before , then you had to bring everything
out," Erica said. And I think:
Yes
You are now
Different
yet
the same
Paul
