Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

Peri Berki - December 9, 1983

Help from the Family Shoemaker

And were there rations? Did you have...?

No, we couldn't go out.

Well, how did you get food?

Some, you know, Gentile people used to bring food.

For money, I mean?

No, not for money.

So they would help?

Helping, helping people. And one to the other gave food also. And some...

So they actually gave food because you couldn't pay for it.

No, no, no, no. I planned then to go away. And one of, the shoemaker of our family. I wrote about it before, but I didn't mention, he, he liked us very much.

He was Gentile or Jewish?

Gentile. Somebody had to come, only Gentile. Jewish couldn't help Jews, only Gentiles could help Jews. And he was, I remember when first we still back, before even we went to the country. He come once one time up to the apartment and told us not to leave the house because he saw that that column of Jewish people were...

Deported?

taken, yeah taken away, we shouldn't leave the house. So he liked us very much. He worked for us for years and he liked us. And he came and brought us food sometimes. And once he brought to this, to this house and I told him that we would like to go away because it's very dangerous here. My son has no paper. Immediately he said you can go and live with my mother. Live with my mother, immediately. You, you ca... It's true.

That's wonderful.

If I'm writing, writing my, reading my paper every time I say it was beautiful, it was wonderful, it was happy. After all we wouldn't be here if it wouldn't be that people weren't helpful going through so many phases of the, of this period. And if we are here we can have it on, thank it only to Catholic people. But I know, still know that they are very anti-Semitic too.

Yeah.


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