picked up a vase from the cupboard and began to arrange the flowers in it. Babi scraped the turnips into a pot, added water, and put it on the hot stove. Then she exploded.
âThat was a fine picture I just witnessed on my land. If you live long enough, you see everything. I can understand Piriâs befriending one of them, but you, Rozsi, Iâm disappointed. I thought you were old enough to know better.â
âWe were only giving him water,â I said.
âMy granddaughters do not have to slake the thirst of our enemy. I had no choice the day he brought you back from the Rika, but Rozsi doesnât have to pay attention to him.â
âJust because he is Hungarian doesnât mean that he is an enemy,â protested Rozsi, her face flushed. I felt sorry for her; this was the first time I ever heard Babi speak to Rozsi in anger. I sat down on one of the kitchen stools.
Babi began to speak again in a calmer voice. âRozsi, donât you know that the Hungarians have been our enemies for years? Since the World War they have been against Jews. We were blamed for the loss of their territories, and for hard times. Everything that went wrong was our fault. They came tearing through here with their pogroms, wanting to kill every Jew. We were not safe in our houses; we were even afraid to go to sleep. That is why three of my children ran off to America.â
âBut that was under Béla Kun. Now Horthy is head of state for Hungary, and he is a friend of the Jews,â said Rozsi.
âNo, Rozsi. As long as there are wars they will always need scapegoats, and as long as we are here, we will be chosen.â
Rozsi stopped setting the table and went outside. Babi sat down next to me. She started to stroke my hair, and I realized that I had been crying. When she spoke her voice was soft. âI should have told you all this before, Piri, but I was hoping that your generation would be spared. A Jew always hopes; it is his nature. But I am afraid that we now have another madman, that Hitler stirring up all of Europe. He marches over othersâ lands like a plague. He is looking to take all of Europe for Germany. He takes from the Czechs with one hand and gives it away to the Hungarians with the other. But he doesnât give anything away for nothing. He is buying the Hungarian army for himself with that land. And theyâve already started taking jobs away from the Jews. Thatâs today, and tomorrow, who knows?â
âWhere is he now?â I asked, my voice wavering as I pictured this monster man moving across the fields with arms as long as the telephone poles in Beregszász.
âIn Poland,â said Babi. She got up and walked over to the stove, to continue her dinner preparations. I was comforted by the distance of Hitler from us, but my mind whirled in the confusion of trying to understand all the things Babi had said to Rozsi and meâpogroms, scapegoatsâwas this what being a Jew meant?
Somewhere in my heart I had known that my Christian friends were different from me; that I lived in their world, not they in mine; that laws came from their world, not mine; that school closed for Christmas and Easter, not Hanukkah and Passover. I had accepted these rules without thinking much about them, just as I accepted having to wash my face and brush my hair. The code was part of my awareness, but I did not dwell on it.
In Beregszász I went to public school and did not choose my friends or separate them by religion. On our street lived Hungarian, Czechoslovak, Russian, and Jewish families. My mother was friendly with all of them. I had attended Protestant services with Ica Molnar and Orthodox Russian services with Vali and Milush Veligan, and Mother did not seem to mind when I had told her where I was going.
But Babiâs attitude toward the Hungarians was not like Motherâs. I remembered an incident that took place during the summer of Grandpa Rosnerâs