The Puppet Boy of Warsaw Read Free Page B

I soaked up his gentle voice, his knowledge and kindness. And algebra was indeed a soothing activity. Yet part of me couldn’t accept his attitude of surrender – why did he not fight? He had been at the university for decades and was respected by all. So where were his colleagues now? Why was no one willing to stand up for him?
    ‘I am old, Mika, you mustn’t worry about me. But you, my boy, you still need to learn and your mother needs you,’ he said, shaking his head. He had no answers and could only lay his hand on my shoulder, light as a bird.
    Weeks passed after we received those directives that lay like a noose around our necks. We held our breath. But just as we began to absorb the shock of our limited world, more orders followed: the Germans wanted us clearly marked and labelled. All Jews had to wear white armbands with a blue Star of David, not less than six centimetres across, on our right sleeve. It had to be sewn on, clearly visible, and of course we had to produce the armbands ourselves. From now on it would always be like that: the Germans created laws, then forced us to make our own ropes to be hanged with. Sure enough, within days sellers waved the hateful armbands from every street corner.
    Soon after that we had to register for ‘Kennkarten’, identity cards, stamped with a large J. J for JEW. How a single letter could change everything. We needed those cards to get our ration books, but our rations were meagre, a tiny fraction of those of the non-Jewish population. Two loaves for the German, one loaf for the Pole, a slice for the Jew. Mother’s soups grew more watery by the day. We could not get milk or eggs and never any meat. Clearly the German master plan was to starve us, kilogram by kilogram.
    To escape the biting hunger, many tried to get hold of Aryan Kennkarten, but if caught they would be dragged to the Pawiak prison. The rumours of torture and murder surrounding this monstrous fortress gave me such nightmares I’d wake up covered in sweat.
    Just when we thought it couldn’t get any worse, in October 1940 they gave us two weeks’ notice to leave our flats, and most of our belongings, and move into a tiny part of the city that the Germans called the Jüdische Wohnbezirk , the Jewish Residential District. The word ‘ghetto’ was taboo, but whispers ran like wildfire through our neighbourhood and we knew it was nothing more than a huge prison.
    Imagine our panic and despair. You could smell fear everywhere, creeping like fog into our homes, hanging thick and sticky over us like a thunderstorm about to break. How could we all fit into this tiny area? There were nearly four hundred thousand of us – an ocean of people trying to fit into a pond, surrounded by a ten-foot-high wall, topped by barbed wire and broken glass.
    On 31 October the Germans herded us into this small segment of the Warsaw map, its northernmost corner, bordered to the west by Okopowa Street and our old Jewish cemetery. It had always been a densely populated part of the city, and although many of the houses were proud three-storey buildings adorned with iron balconies, most of the streets were narrow and dark. The Germans had forced all non-Jews to leave the area to make space for us, and as we moved into the ghetto we were greeted by an eerie quietness.
    Mama took a long time to sort out what to bring with us. I can still see her in our old flat, picking up this candleholder or that book, forced to choose between a pot and a picture frame. In the end she chose the most precious and the most practical things: a photo album, some books, the silver candleholders that had been a wedding present, two pots, clothes and bedding. She bundled them together and then we joined the march. Our little unit, our tiny family: Mama, Tatus and me.
    We marched in silence, carrying our remaining possessions in battered suitcases and makeshift rucksacks on our back. People pulled carts or pushed prams filled with boxes, duvets, cushions and