The Fugu Plan

by Marvin Tokayer

  The situation among the relief workers - as distinct from the refugees themselves - was also quite different. In Kobe, those involved with relief work, totaled less than fifty. Except for a handful of professionals, they were all newcomers to the problems of organizing and maintaining destitute strangers; but they were virtually all Russian Jews, and as such shared a common background and point of view with their Eastern European charges. In Shanghai, due to the multi-cultural make-up of the Jewish community - and due to the size of the refugee problem - not one but six major organizations (with many more committees and subcommittees), each with its own viewpoint, served the refugees. Until 1940 and the arrival of a few relief workers from various worldwide Jewish self-help organizations, the Shanghai relief scene was well-intentioned chaos. The professionals who reorganized things their way, created yet another dimension of friction, and the chaos subsided into simple bureaucracy. Hardly anything was possible, but everything was difficult. In the memory of one exasperated diarist: "In those days, a most ordinary thing could only be effectuated by utmost persistence . . . the energy spent was in no proportion to the success attained."

  By the time the Polish refugees arrived from Kobe, in the late summer of 1941, the professional relief workers at least had shifted the work onto a reasonable level of efficiency. Thus, it should have been a simple matter for him, the European refugee - aid organization, and the Joint Distribution Committee to redirect funds from Kobe to their representatives in Shanghai (just as Wahrhaftig had promised Inuzuka the previous spring). The additional money would be added to the already existing funds, the additional refugees would be added to the already existing population. . . .

  Life should only be so easy. When confronted with the living arrangements established by the Shanghai relief workers, the Polish refugees were by no means as tractable as their German predecessors. Under no circumstances would they accept what they considered the "degradation" of living as many as two hundred to a room in a Shanghai heim! To the envy of the Germans - and the exasperation of Laura Margolies, the JDC representative from America - the Polish Jews made their refusal stick. Backed-up by the vociferous arguments of Eastjewcom, the Polish refugees convinced him and the JDC that they should receive their share of the funds directly through that organization. With the H1CEM-JDC stipend as a base, and small additional allotments from Va' ad Hatzalah and other Orthodox groups in the United States, even those Polish Jews who could not find so much as occasional employment could maintain a basic level of independence. Of the eleven hundred who arrived in the late summer of 1941, no more than a handful actually had to spend any time in a Shanghai heim.

  Not that where they did live was so much better. Within a few weeks, the Mir Yeshiva was set up for living and learning in and around the beautiful Beth Aharon Synagogue in Hongkew. But for the rest, aside from a few dozen, like the Amshenover rebbe, who had been welcomed into the pleasant French Concession, housing meant half a floor or less in one of the twelve-by-thirty-foot houses that lined the close, dank lanes of Hongkew. But they didn't care. If they weren't housed luxuriously, they could at least maintain a pretense of privacy. And if the food allowance, particularly for those who had no other income, was never enough, at least they could decide for themselves how and when and what they wouldn't have enough of and they didn't have to stand in line for two hours for the privilege of doing it. (Heim food was worse than plain. A popular cartoon showed two residents in conversation: "Well, Max, what day of the week is it? Red beans or white beans?")

  The eleven hundred Polish refugees worked themselves into the Shanghai economy as best they could as waiters, secondhand dealers, tailors, and so on. One man, the proud possessor of an alarm clock, organized a "wake-up service" for his less fortunate fellows. And, considering their number, they made a remarkably strong impression on the entire Jewish community of Shanghai, but particularly on those culturally closest to them - the Russians.

  The Poles were much more "Jewish" than their German cousins. They were less secular, less interested in assimilating themselves into the mainstream culture. They were more observant of the halakah, the law that governs the lives of religious Jews. And they were energetic in their encouragement to others to observe as well. The Polish refugees set up two schools - one for boys, one for girls where a strong secular education was combined with in-depth religious learning. Several of the yeshiva boys even undertook crash courses in English simply for the purpose of teaching Judaism to Sephardic children who spoke no other language. The most pervasive influence of the newly arrived Poles, however, was not religious but linguistic: they spoke Yiddish.

  Among the Russian Jews of Shanghai, Yiddish - that magnificently expressive language made up of German, Hebrew, Russian and miscellaneous bits of half a dozen other East European tongues - had been spoken only at home. Suddenly the words came out in public. Yiddish newspapers and magazines appeared Unser Leben, Unser Welt, Dos Wort, Der Yiddisher Almanack . . . Yiddish theater which in the late nineteenth century had exploded with creative enthusiasm in Europe and America, was suddenly right there in their midst. Even on the radio, for a brief period every day, one could hear Yiddish newscasts, music commentary, even lectures in mama-lashon. With the arrival of the Poles, "to be a Jew in Shanghai" took on new meaning.

  Avram Chesno rolled over in his bed and tried to bury his head in his arms against the intrusion of the morning light. Last night had been impossible. No sooner had the Russians below finished their screaming match uniting thereafter in conjugal bliss, the sounds of which seeped through the floorboards with uncanny clarity than the Chinese across the lane began a battle with cooking pots and tin buckets. Avram groaned into his elbow. But the sunlight was relentless - which was just as well. He rolled over again onto his back and opened his eyes. After eight weeks, his twelve-by-sixteen foot cubicle with a seven foot ceiling was only too familiar. But it was reasonably clean. It gave him enough space for a bed, table, a straight-backed chair and some hooks for his clothes. And small as it was, it was his alone. At least that he thought was as it should be. Because Avram Chesno had earned the money to pay for it.

  Five months ago, in Kobe he had again been refused an American visa. What the hell was he doing here? Why could he not seem to break out of this dead-end entanglement of dependence? Where could he go to get back into the world of real people - a place where people did things for themselves, where people were liberated from begging favors? Why did America not accept him? The visa officer in Kobe gave him no reason but said Chemo could apply again in six months if he liked. Avram stared at the man uncomprehending. Didn't he know what a length of time six months was? It was almost July then. Was he supposed to wait out the entire year doing nothing? Avram had felt like grabbing the bland, blond American and hurling him headfirst through the third floor window. Instead he turned on his heel and stamped out. Who needed America?

  After two days, he had calmed down sufficiently to be more constructive. Jewcom maintained a list of all the foreign schools in Shanghai, and he had written to each of them. Only one had been interested, but one was enough. A Miss Lucie Hartwich, headmistress of the Shanghai Jewish Youth Association School, 1oo Kinchow Road, Hongkew district, Shanghai, offered part-time employment teaching science. Standing in the doorway of Kobe Jewcom headquarters, reading her brief, formal letter, Avram remembered the day he had been accepted in the university, the day Ruthie had agreed to become his wife, the day he had been hired by one of the most prestigious high schools in Warsaw. A part-time post in a little Jewish school in a burned-out section of a city on the edge of Asia? For a teacher of his attainments, this was nothing! But for Chesno now, this was everything. A job. A job doing something he was trained for, something he liked. Never mind that the salary she offered was only barely enough to live on. With a job, he would be back in the world of men. Immediately, savoring every stroke of the pen, Avram had accepted the offer.

  Now, from the other side of a plywood partition, he could hear Mrs. Tookansky
setting out cups for breakfast tea. A frugal woman with a husband and a father to look out for, she had been quite happy to make "an arrangement." Every week Avram contributed some of his precious Shanghai dollars to her budget; every breakfast and every dinner, he partook equally of whatever she was serving. Mrs. Tookansky was not an award-winning cook; and she was further limited by the strict laws of kashrulh. But somehow, despite escalating prices in Hongkew - where everything nonetheless was at least thirty percent cheaper than in Shanghai's International Settlement or the fashionable residential Frenchtown - she managed to serve at least part of a chicken every Sabbath. Avram was well satisfied with the arrangement.

  When the bell rang at the end of that morning, Avram's students streamed out of the classroom, their imaginations full of the strange properties of sodium, "the metal you can cut with a butter knife!" Avram was pleased, as he had been pleased with every class since he had begun teaching here. The enthusiasm of these children inspired him. They devoured knowledge. After a tortuous trek across half the world, their minds were burdened with tragedy and emotional upheaval. Their home lives, where everything was "make do," were punctuated by short-tempered, jobless fathers and anxious mothers. Despite, or maybe because of, these appalling drawbacks, the students wanted to learn, were avid to learn, about everything and anything. And not only science. The French- and Chinese-language teachers said the same, as did the music teacher, the English teacher, the Bible and Hebrew teachers, even the gym teacher.

  Someone had recently written in the visitors' book: "Happy laughter resounds again in a world that had forgotten how to smile." A little sentimental, Chesno thought, but true nonetheless. In the beginning, the enthusiasm and proficiency of his students had put him to shame at first. English was the school's language of instruction. And from the start of the first day, it had been clear that Avram's English was not up to the students' standards, though it was as much a second language for them as for him. Cursing himself for having "wasted his time" studying Hebrew in Vilna, Chesno spent hour after hour in the school's wicker-furnished library devouring grammar books and English-language science texts. Within a couple of weeks, he had lost his disadvantage and even gained a certain amount of added respect from his students.

  "Mr. Chesno?"

  Avram looked up to see a small boy in the doorway.

  "Syrkin, isn't it? Yes, what is it?"

  Dovid was too young to be in one of his science classes, but Avram had not been surprised to meet the boy in the hallways of this particular school. He had gathered from seeing the family intermittently after that first time in the Vilna library that it had no money. And the Kadoorie School - as it was commonly called after its Sephardi founder and benefactor - was the only school in Shanghai that never turned a child away if his family could not pay the tuition.

  "Mr. Chesno, if you twist your ankle so hard you can't walk on it, will it just get better by itself after a while?"

  Dovid did not appear to be limping. "Your ankle?" Avram asked.

  "No. A friend of mine."

  "Well, I should say your friend should go to the school clinic and have the doctor look at it."

  When Kadoorie had founded the school, he had not confined himself to books and teachers. There were vocational programs, after-school clubs, sports teams, religious services and a well-run clinic that kept detailed records on every child.

  Dovid let pass the reference to the clinic. "But will it get better by itself?" he repeated.

  "It's impossible to say, you know. I'm not a doctor. Maybe yes, maybe no. You really need a doctor."

  Dovid looked at him with soft brown eyes, too large for such a small face. "All right," he said, wanting, Avram thought, to say more but instead saying only, "Thank you very much," and turning back toward the door.

  For God's sake, what is this? Avram thought.

  "Dovid'l, kum aher. Vos is mil dir?" For some things, only Yiddish will do.

  At the familiar sounds, Dovid gave in. Perching himself on the edge of one of the desks, he gave a deep sigh and began on the problem.

  "We have a boy living with us, you see. Moishe is the older brother of my friend Sophie. You know Sophie? No? Well, Moishe is too old for school because he is over fourteen, so he found a job."

  Very enterprising of him, Avram thought, what with so many of the few employment ads now specifying "Refugees Need Not Apply."

  "He works for this Chinaman who has a peanut-crushing factory," Dovid went on. "Moishe crushes the peanuts. He works a machine that is kind of like a bicycle. At least, it has pedals and a chain like a bicycle. But yesterday when he came home, he almost couldn't walk because his foot had slipped on the pedal. And today he can't walk at all. And he's afraid if he can't go to work tomorrow, too, the Chinaman will fire him."

  "I see," Avram said. "Well, since he has a job, I would think he might have enough money to pay for a visit to the Jewish Hospital in Frenchtown. It doesn't cost much, you know. Anyway," he added, "maybe Moishe has insurance?"

  Two years before, the Association of Central European Physicians (refugees all) had been formed in the knowledge that far too few refugees could afford even the low fees that the doctors charged. Now, for a dollar a month, one could be insured for fifty percent of any medical bill, and even twenty-five percent of a dental bill.

  Dovid shook his head sadly. "There's no insurance. The Chinaman hasn't paid him yet. Just to get the job Moishe has to work free for the first two weeks."

  Avram had decidedly mixed feeling about the mass of Chinese among whom he was living. By no means could they be faulted for being too poor to be clean. There had been enough Jews in Europe who had been in the same predicament. And manners and customs varied so much from one place to another that he couldn't simply dismiss them as savages for not behaving like Europeans. But exploiting fifteen-year-old boys was too much.

  "Where is this Moishe now?" he asked.

  14B Tongshan Road, where we live," Dovid said hopefully.

  "Stop by at I :00 after your last class. I'll go home with you."

  Dovid looked as if the weight of the world had been lifted off his shoulders. "Danke shein, danke shein," he said, then hurried off down the corridor.

  Chesno heard the scope of the problem before he saw it.

  "Moishe, it's just a cloth with warm water." A young girl's voice drifted down the dark stairway as Avram carefully made his way up the rickety steps. The October weather had cooled off a little, but the higher he went, the stickier and more odorous the air became.

  "Don't put anything on it, I told you. Just leave it alone." Moishe's voice was brimming over with anger and agony.

  Dovid opened the door. The room was about twice the size of Avram's own, but quite obviously it was living, eating and sleeping space for five people. The boy lay on a mattress on the floor, his foot raised on a kind of cushion formed from a twisted dirty sheet. He was white with pain.

  "Dovid, I told you, no doctor!" Moishe said harshly.

  "I'm no doctor," Avram said, vaguely recollecting having seen the boy before. "I'm a friend of Dovid's. Can you stand on it at all?"

  "No," Moishe sighed, angry not at Dovid or Sophie but at himself. He'd managed to get a job so at least he could contribute to the household a little. After all the hassle of bargaining with the Chinaman, after working like a coolie for nearly two weeks, after all that, what had he done but stupidly, stupidly put his foot down wrong on the pedal on the very last day before he actually started earning money.

  Avram bent over the ankle. It was swollen and red, possibly broken, certainly in need of treatment.

  "I'm afraid you're going to have to see a doctor."

  Moishe only shook his head. "No, no."

  Avram looked first at Sophie, then at Dovid. Both were looking down at the rough bare floor. Even so young, they were embarrassed by the poverty.

  "If you ever want to walk again," Avram added as an afterthought.

  Moishe's head stopped shaking.

 
"I'm not a doctor, but I know something about bones. If you don't get that ankle looked at, it will turn gangrenous and you know what that can lead to."

  Moishe turned even paler. Nothing was said for what seemed like a long time. Finally the boy shifted his eyes to look at Avram who for his part was now looking studiously out of a window.

  "You know, there's a difference between accepting charity and taking out a loan," he said as if it wasn't of any particular interest to him one way or the other. "For instance, if I were to advance you the money to cover the cost of the doctor - and the cost of getting there in a rickshaw because you obviously can't walk two kilometers if I did that, I would consider it only a loan which I would expect to be paid back once you were on your feet again."

  The silence returned. Avram continued studying the dismal view out the window.

  "Paid back how?" the voice finally responded from the mattress.

  "That would depend on what I needed done when the ankle was healed," he said, having absolutely no idea what a fifteen-year-old boy could do for him at any time.

  Moishe tried to shift his leg and a jab of pain shot up from his foot. Oi! What choice did he have?

  "All right, it'a deal," he said, forcing himself, in spite of the pain, into a half-sitting position.

  Sophie turned away quickly, burying her face in her hands and weeping with relief. As Dovid went over to comfort her, Avram reached down and pulled Moishe up by the arms.

  "The deal was the easy part," he said. "Now comes the hard part: getting you down those three flights of stairs isn't going to be a picnic."

  "Right," Moishe said quietly. "Unlike everything else over the past two years, this is not going to be a picnic. Give me that shirt, will you Dovid?"

  Avram steadied him as he stood on one leg and finished getting dressed. They then started the agonizing maneuver of descending to the street.