Autobiography part 1

updated:
July, 08 2001 16:11

A car is travelling at a leisurely speed down the Cross-Shomron road. Once it was silver coloured, but that was sixteen years ago. Now the car is old, but still functioning well. The driver was also younger then, I think. My left hand is leaning out through the window and reaching up, to hold the edge of the roof. Though the weather is more than hot, the window is open, as the car has no airconditioner. My right hand holds the steering wheel in a light grip, that tells of a longstanding rela- tionship with the car. The radio plays Chopin and I am not in a hurry. When the concerto will end, I shall listen to a nocturne and another concerto. By then I shall be in Jerusalem. On the way back, I can listen to Bruckner's seventh. I won't be bored. I feel alone and very lonely. My children are married and my ex-wife has told me, that Mr. Adolf did not do his job properly, because it is a crime to let people like me live. Long ago I had stopped trying to make something good out of a bad job and now it was just a formality.
The orchestra leaves the performance to the pianist and I accompany the music with great pleasure. I am approaching the Tapuah junction and stop a second at the sign, then I leave the Jerusalem road and continue east. The road is deserted and so is the countryside. It's a desert, this land of Efraïm. Calm and majestic in its natural beauty. There is a straight stretch of one mile with Migdalim looming on the mountain at the right. Then it's past and the road plunges, with the southbound road show- ing straight ahead. But I know, that it is a fallacy. Suddenly the road turns left and there's a sign "Slow" and further down is the Stop sign. There I have to turn right onto the road, which look- ed first straight ahead. The engine grinds out its displeasure at having to take this steep incline, but after several minutes, the road levels off and the car picks up speed. There are Arab villages, not far from the road and signs of burnt tires. I check,

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whether my pistol is free in its holster. Usually I slip it into my waistband, but here I like to keep it more accessible and with a spare magazine. But I never had to use it, for which I am grate- ful. Killing is for hunters and I am not a hunter, I belong rather more to the hunted. After a while I am in Benjamin and here the landscape changes again to desert. The road plunges and rises, twists right and left. Now I am mounting towards a pass up ahead and would like to stop and photograph the view, if I had a camera. Now I am through the pass and a new vista is

displayed. At my right tower mighty mountains, beautiful giants, ahead is a rock-wall that defies passage, at my left is a splendid valley with green fields and in front of the car is the road, that plung- es and rises, turning to the left to the next pass. I accelerate slightly to 60 mph,

to help the car gather speed for the ascent. There is another car coming towards me and I steer the car more to the right. And then I am at the top, turn right going through the pass and there is another breathtaking view ahead. I think of the boring Tel Aviv-Jerusalem highway, with young drivers racing at 90 mph, well over the speedlimit, which makes me nervous. Then I think of the boring view, that one gets, driving down to the coast. It reminds me of Holland, where I was born and which is flat like a tabletop. But now I have no friends or relatives there, no reason to go there for a vacation. The fairy-tale, that the Dutch people were any better than the others, during the Holocoast, has been shattered. I knew it always, for I came back to Amsterdam from Bergen-Belsen, to be told: "A pity, that you returned! Filthy Jew!" and the older boys had to protect the younger, when they were playing in front of the Jewish school. Maybe, they were not as bad as the Polish, but who can tell? And my mind wanders off again, to the memories of childhood, that cannot be erased and the pain, that grows with time, with the realization, that what could have been, will never be and that the great expectations have not been met. And then I check myself and am very grateful, for the nice family, that is mine, even if not with me at present. And the numerous grand-children, that call me Sava. And for the nephews and nieces, all over the globe, with their children, who are all my parents' grand-children and great- grandchildren. Who would have believed this fifty years ago?
This is a tale of a quarter-century of horrible and bloody history, wherein ordinary humdrum people raised themselves to heroic, selfless deeds. Some which are interesting enough to find their way into history books, like Recha Sternbuch. Some are just those self-sacrifices, like Franzi Goldschmidt, for which this era has become famous.

(to be continued)

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