by Malka Adler
Issasschar sat down on my bed and showed me a letter. He said, this is from the hospital, I’m sorry, but I don’t understand what’s written in the letter. I said to him, I’m not going anywhere, I’m healthy.
My brother immediately agreed, saying, I won’t permit my brother to go to hospital. We had enough hospital in Germany, understand? The instructor left.
A day later I was called to the doctor.
My brother didn’t want to come with me. His mouth was white, he struck his leg with his fist and told me, be careful Dov, be careful, and don’t go anywhere alone with the doctor, d’you hear me?
I said, very well, don’t worry, and gave him a candy I’d hidden in my pocket.
The instructor and I went into the infirmary. The smell of medication made my body prickle. The doctor spoke to the instructor. I realized the doctor knew how to talk. The instructor translated. There was only one problem, the instructor didn’t know how to say hernia in Yiddish. He told me to remove my trousers. I did so. The doctor pointed to my groin. I knew the place. Sometimes it hurt there. It began in Hungary, on nights when father, my brothers and I dragged heavy logs to train cars. We did this work for food. The instructor took a stick used to examine the throat and broke it in two. He said, hernia, hernia, I didn’t understand. Finally, he said, we have to operate, I’ll come with you.
I went with the instructor to the Italian hospital in Tiberias.
My third time in hospital in a year. We waited on a bench and I wanted a plane to come from the skies and hurl a bomb on the doctors’ room. I rose from the bench and went to the toilet. Returned and sat down. About twenty minutes later I went to the toilet again. I had a lot of urine because I was afraid of the anesthetic that would keep me in hospital for three months.
I couldn’t explain to the doctor what I’d gone through. The instructor’s Yiddish wasn’t sufficient for my troubles. I said to him, tell me, how do I get to the nearest ship to Tiberias, ah? He hugged me and I was called inside.
I lay in hospital for ten days after surgery.
I had a lot of pain in my leg, belly and head. They placed a heavy bag of sand on the wound to fix it in place. I couldn’t move. The nurses washed me in bed with water and soap, dried me with a towel, bandaged the wound, talking and laughing loudly, all in Hebrew. They were nice, those Hebrew-speaking nurses. One was red-haired with red skin as if she’d lain in the sun for two months. She’d purse her lips and let the air out like a tune, ttshshsh ttshshsh, and smile at me. Another one gathered up her hair behind like a black banana with a lot of pins in her hair. I was ashamed to say in Yiddish, ouch, I’m in pain, and take away this bag. I felt like a wretched, weak old man. I had another problem. In the bed opposite was a young man who made me laugh. His name was Maurice and he had enormous ears. He knew how to move his ears up and down and turn his lips over like a sock. He’d pout with his lips and turn them inside out. The worst was during the doctors’ rounds. A doctor would stand next to my bed with a few nurses, and read my card, and in the meantime, from the side, I’d see Maurice turning his lips in and out. I couldn’t stop laughing because of him.
When I laughed, the place of the surgery hurt even more. I begged him, enough Maurice, enough. Maurice ignored me. I started lying with my face to the wall. It didn’t help. He’d say something, just a word, and I knew he was talking to me with his lips inside out.
I had many visits in hospital. Issasschar visited me almost every day. As well as other friends from the group. My brother didn’t come to visit. I wasn’t angry with him. Today, I know: My brother Yitzhak will never set foot in a hospital. Not even for himself. The three months he spent looking after me in the hospital in Indersdorf at the end of the war were enough for him. I remember when they wanted to give him an injection and he fainted.
Ever since the surgery in Tiberias, I’ve had two more operations on my groin. My wife, Shosh, visits me, the children visit, friends come, Hannah, Yitzhak’s wife, also comes to visit. She always says that Yitzhak follows her around the house saying, go to Dov, go on, go. He doesn’t come, he can’t set foot in a hospital.
After the surgery in Tiberias, I realized another miracle had happened to me. A day after the surgery I was told that the doctor who did the surgery on my groin was a spy and they caught him that night. He’d spied for Lebanon. He was immediately imprisoned. At first I was alarmed. He could, after all, have killed me with his knife. These thoughts brought iciness to my back in the middle of a heat-wave.
I called out, miracle, miracle. Someone is looking after me from above. When my brother Yitzhak heard the story, he immediately looked for a chair to sit on and asked for water with five spoons of sugar. I gave him water and a piece of bread I had in my pocket. He threw away the bread, got up and put his fist through the glass window.
The glass broke with his shouts, I told you not to go with doctors, I told you it was dangerous.
However, I was satisfied with the surgery. The pain in my groin stopped and in my heart I came to a decision, I, Dov, will be a good laborer in this village, and it was all because Issasschar said, in Eretz-Israel, the most important thing is to be a farmer, like the goys in your villages in Hungary, or in Poland. And then he asked me, what is your profession?
I said, mechanic, just as I said on the ramp at Auschwitz, without meaning it. But in the meantime, I had experience from the garage in Germany. In the village they were glad. They needed a mechanic for their garage.
I got out of bed at four in the morning. I remember a loud knock at the door. I put a foot out of bed and went outside. I’d gone to bed in my work clothes. I’d woken at least an hour before four and counted the stars at the window.
The guard who called me had a gun on his shoulder. He nodded good morning and accompanied me to the garage. I felt like a certified mechanic with a diploma from Germany, and it made me want to cry. I wanted to say to the guard, thank you, sir, for accompanying me to work and making sure I find the way. I didn’t say a word. I knew the guard didn’t understand Yiddish.
I parted from the guard near the garage. The head mechanic was waiting for me. He stood half asleep, yawning loudly. His yawns smelled of coffee. He wore a cap on his head and smiled pleasantly in between yawns. A dog ran between us, licked my shoes and wagged its tail. I took a piece of bread from my pocket and gave it to the dog.
The mechanic took me round the garage and explained things in Hebrew. I didn’t understand a single word. I nodded and stroked the dog that ran after us. In the meantime we finished our round and he gave me a heavy container and showed me an automobile on the side. I opened the lid of the container and smelled it. The smell of oil. I didn’t know what to do. I spoke Yiddish, Hungarian, Russian, a little German and I had no words for him. I waited. He opened the bonnet of the engine, pointed at a hole like the opening of a pipe, and gestured with his head. I understood that he wanted me to pour the oil into the pipe. I lifted the container and poured the oil – straight onto the ground. The mechanic grabbed his head and flung off his cap, he shouted something, and gestured to me in the direction of the path. I understood him and left the place.
Four-thirty in the morning and I’m alone on the path.
It was dark and I was ashamed. I stuck my hands deep in my pockets and began wandering about aimlessly. In our building the buddies were asleep. I didn’t know anyone else in the village. I walked for another fifty meters and then I heard the mechanic shouting, Dov, Dov, I stopped. I turned back. He was standing under the lamp at the garage and beckoning to me to come back. I went back. I realized I’d made a mistake. Realized I’d wasted very expensive oil. I didn’t know how to apologize in Hebrew and I was sorry. I looked for words that were familiar to the mechanic. And then I had an idea. I started to sing Hatikvah to him. I remembered some of the words. He stood straight as a flag, I also straightened up and we sang together. Then he put a hand on my shoulder and began to explain about engines. His motions were delicate, and I understood that he’d forgiven me. F
rom the car we went on to a wood panel like a table. He took out paper from one of the drawers and drew me an engine, naming each part and marking it with an arrow. I realized that in the village they believed I was a professor of tractors. They were sure they’d received a certified mechanic from Germany. I couldn’t say that I’d learned mechanics on an old jalopy in a small garage. And I couldn’t tell them in their language that I was hungry. Constantly hungry.
During the first weeks we had a common kitchen. We ate as much as we wanted. Well, more or less. In the village they decided to close the kitchen. They allocated us to families. The food they put on the plate was a quarter of what I really wanted. I was ashamed to ask for more. When they put a bowl in the middle of the table I took the same as everyone else, two-three spoons, but I could have eaten the bowl by myself. Even two bowls. There was tzena – austerity measures – in the country. Moshav members ate what there was during the tzena, bread, cheese, some vegetables, sometimes eggs, barely any meat at all. They thought we were like them. We weren’t like them. I couldn’t tell the family about the hunger I’d known in the camps, and shout, the food in your bowl isn’t enough for me, I need ten bowls, I have to eat meat, lots of helpings of meat. And then I had bad thoughts, if there wasn’t enough food in the village, the members would start shooting, start to reduce us, yes. They’ll wipe out some of our group so there’ll be enough food for everybody.
I said to my brother, Yitzhak: I can’t bear thinking of bread all day. The dreams at night are bad enough. I can’t go back to potato peels, understand?
My brother looked down. Made a small hole in the ground with his heel and said, so I’ll get bread for you. And Yitzhak did, because Yitzhak knew how to get hold of bread, and no matter how much he brought, I wanted more, but most of all I wanted to run away.
Chapter 45
Yitzhak
We came from the Holocaust to a new hell.
Again songs and clapping. Again the smiles of regular families with a father and a mother, small children, a nicely set table, and a mother taking a handkerchief from her sleeve to wipe her child’s nose, and afterwards a hug. We saw a father who drove a combine, who at night was a hero guarding a post with a gun. And what were we, they burned our father and mother and they burned our grandfather and grandmother, and they burned our siblings and aunts and uncles. We were ashamed. They talked and talked and I didn’t understand a word. I kept checking with the others, did you understand what they said to you, did you? Nothing. When we began to understand their language we began to understand what they were saying about us in this country. They called us soap, said you went like sheep to the slaughter and didn’t resist. You didn’t fight like men. There were thousands of you in their trains, why didn’t you revolt. You could have grabbed their guns, at least wiped out a few Germans before the crematorium. Aah. We felt new enemies had risen against us. For the Germans we were garbage, in Eretz-Israel we were sheep. This talk wounded my heart. Pain in the morning, pain in the evening, and at night, most of all. I wanted to erase Auschwitz, Buchenwald and Zeiss from my mind, and I couldn’t. And then came the nerves, because I realized that the hell wasn’t over. Sometimes I wanted to bring down an ax on the natives of this country. Chop some of them in two. Maybe just a blow to the head, without chopping.
They put us to work from the first day. They allocated us several places, like the cowshed, chicken coops and fields. They told us, do this, do that, a lot of explanations and hand gestures, because they wanted everything to be just right, and it was hard for me. They taught us to carry a sack of mash on our backs, hold tight with both arms, walk bowed from the truck to the storehouse, and we saw the crumbling bodies of prisoners to be dragged to a large pile. They gave us a shovel to dig a hole for a tree, and we saw a pit for the dead. They played classical music for us in the village on a cello and we heard the orchestra of Auschwitz and the screams of a mother, Golda’leh, Golda’leh, they’ve taken my Tuvia. They wanted us to sit in an ordinary classroom to learn Hebrew and flames and fire came out of our ears. Issasschar, the translator with the protruding teeth, said, come and learn to dance the Hora, come on buddies, let’s go, kick your legs up high everyone, to the side, and now stamp your feet three times, tak. tak. tak. And under my feet, I saw a face like dirty dough. Hardest of all were the fires. The village bell would ring and everyone would run with wet rags, or a pail full of water, or a special bat to put out the fire in the fields or the woods. People would shout, where’s the fire, where is it, and I would stand stock still. Because just seeing the smoke would bring pressure to my ears. It was the same with the bonfire and the song Hinei Ma Tov– brothers sitting around the fire together. The flames were high and there was smoke and I saw my family disappearing into the smoke. I’d hear the pak. pak. pak of branches, and remember the pak-pak-pak of the lice cooking in the steam.
And there was the urgent need to get used to life in a collective.
I didn’t understand their economic method. A cowshed the size I remembered from home, and it belonged to everyone, the chicken coops belonged to everyone, the vegetable garden to everyone, I asked, and who gains in the end, everyone, and the losses, everyone, who covers them?
Nobody – we write it down, and then what, we continue working and hope for the best, what do you mean hope for the best, hoping for the best is … nu, what’s wrong with you, why are you so worried, Yitzhak.
I said, because I want to understand, ultimately, who gives. They said to me, God gives, all right?
I worried even more.
We worked physically hard, the pocket was empty. I asked, where will I get money to buy things.
They asked me, what do you need, Yitzhak.
I said, work boots, for instance.
They said, go to the store.
But they don’t have any.
They said, order shoes and they’ll get them for you.
When will they get them.
At least two-three weeks.
I said, where will they get them, from the market? I know a very good market, and I want to buy them myself.
They said, what do you mean a market, we buy them from a proper store.
I went to the village store to order shoes.
Prices at the store were fixed. I couldn’t feel the goods or weigh them in my hands. I wanted to lower the price of sugar. They said, you need to understand, we don’t bargain here.
Why not, because everyone’s equal in a collective, there’s no difference, all members earn the same. I couldn’t understand how the hell people earn if they have no money in their pockets, they explained to me that each member has a budget, everything is written down in a book in the office.
I asked, and if a member wants to buy something.
They said, he buys it.
And how does he pay.
No problem, they reduce the numbers in the book.
I said, and if I feel like working double the hours, to earn more money.
They told me, that’s fine, but the budget doesn’t change.
I went back to my room and banged my head against the wall.
I really missed the Perechyn market. The barrels of fish and sauerkraut, sacks of beans and rice, packages of spices, colorful pieces of fabric, lamps, work tools, and the cries of vendors. I missed standing with a good joke or some story, there was always time for small talk in the market, no one was in a hurry. At the store I realized I had to hurry because there were other people there and everyone was buying from the same vendor.
And there was the problem of food.
The food they gave us wasn’t enough. They put half a tomato, onion, a piece of cheese, a few olives and a slice of bread on the plate. That’s all. There was barely any meat. It brought despair and a lot of anger. Our bodies began to live. We were hungry even when we were full. My brother Dov received a loaf of bread per day at work in the field. He’d finish the loaf at breakfast. There was no bread left for lunch. The members demanded hard work from us, they needed us a
s laborers in order to work the farm, and we worked hard, but the food they put on our plates drove us mad. We were ashamed to complain because the members of the village ate as we did. They gave us what they gave themselves. They had no knowledge of the enormous hole we had in our bellies.
We began to run wild in the dining room. We fell upon the poor vegetables on the table, on the margarine and jam. We’d grab margarine and smear it on each other. We’d have water fights with water from the jugs. We laughed like madmen so we wouldn’t cry. Don’t know why. Maybe we were releasing nerves from the war. We were like a bottle of soda that had fallen to the floor with a closed cork. Maybe we needed to pour out our hearts, but we were ashamed of our past. And even if we hadn’t been ashamed, how could we have explained without language, how?
I felt I was beginning to go mad.
I wanted to peel off my skin.
Dov said, I can’t live in a place like this, understand.
I said to him, it’s hard for me too, believe me, but let’s give the place a chance. I started to make a plan regarding the food. I made a map in my mind of the places where there was food. I got out of bed in the morning for work, and I searched, yes. In the chicken coops there were eggs. In the bakery there was bread. Vegetables in the vegetable garden. I planned what I should take at night when nobody could see. And so we began eating on the side. I saw other members of our group also making plans. We started wandering around at night in groups. Each group ate in a different place. Some ate behind the chicken coops, or near the pen. Some went down to the woods. It was the first time we felt free. When we sang Hatikvah in the hall, being a free nation, we didn’t really feel free. Only when eating with our group, in our language, did we really feel free. After a night like that, there were some who didn’t want to get up for work in the morning. In the village they thought we were lazy. They didn’t know we wandered around at night looking for food.
