Miriam Monczyk-Laczkowska Ferber - December 7, 1999
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It must have been a bit of a shock to you.
I don't think it was a shock. I was more relieved. But now that I heard it from her mouth, I, I had, I had a good feeling and I had a ill feeling. I don't, I can't explain it to you, but it was in my guts. But the first thing that I did, I went right away to the Jewish community, to the Gmina in Sosnowiec. But at that point no Jews wanted to talk to me. Why? Because they were busy. They were leaving. They didn't know. I was very offended. How dare they don't spend any time with me. How dare don't listen to me. But now that I grew up and I know what Jewish people went through. Uh, they were there, you know, waiting for the, the ticket to Israel. And, and, they, they didn't know where they were going. They didn't know what to expect. And they were packing, they were busy. Some were leaving to America through, through Europe, you know.
Yeah.
And most of them were leaving to Israel. They couldn't even say Israel. They were still calling Palestine, which was so terrible because since [laughs] 1948 it was no more Palestine. Oh, the Palestinian agenda, the Palestinian agenda.
So what did you...
It was like a, like a curse. It was not like a, I'm going to United States of America! Or, or, you know.
When you went to the Jewish community, the Gmina, were these religious Jews that you were talking to?
Some of them were, but...
Not all of them.
The religious didn't want to bother with me. None of them wanted to bother with me. They were tired. They were tired, they were um, they wanted to leave Poland and, you know. So, I did not get any feedback from the Je....And I, I got mad at them and I, I never went back.
You never...
But, but now all of a sudden I was superior to all the Polacks. I was a Jew, and like, some of them felt inferior, you know.
You think?
Jewish people felt inferior.
Yeah.
Well, a, a lot of them, until today the ones that I met in Prague. Uh, you know, they, they don't want to talk about it, they feel--I felt superior. Now, when I went on a date, before I went on a date, I told the guy I'm Jewish.
Now you told them.
I'm Jewish and I was proud of it and I was different. I was the chosen one. And when I recited that, that Adam Miskevitch, that one poem that is a part--that the Yankiel, who is a Jew, plays the cymbals. And he's a Jew. And he talks to the General Dombrowski and because I was Jewish I was proud to recite this poem even more.
Hm.
Um, at that point I had a good time. I was advertising that I was Jewish.
How did you...
The whole school knew.
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