Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

Alexander Karp - June 22, 1983

Conclusion

Are there times now when something will remind you of something that happened during the war?

Well obviously there are times and somehow it's, it's very funny. As time goes, as you know, the more so you reminisce what has happened--perhaps the earlier years. Some people say that they we were trying to shape the past. I don't want to remember it, because it's affecting me. And no doubt everybody's affected by it one, one way; another one, another way. But nobody's without any affect per se. No one is left totally immune to it. But in the earlier years, I say, perhaps the importance wasn't given so much, because anything and everything what you want to establish, it needs some kind of organizational effort. And at that point people may have been preoccupied individually with themselves, rather than collectively. Everyone wanted to make either a living for themselves, or carve out a profession for themselves--to be again as a reborn contribution to society, whether you were in America, or you were in Australia, or you were left in Hungary or wherever. But as time went by, now, especially with this spark of certain people, because you always do need some people spark certain movement, now, it came to realize that this is really more than just a individual thing. That in order to pass down to the future we need connectivity to it. And once this has an established--once this has got off the ground, you know, I think that more and more people are joining it. 'Cause now you don't have to relive the past, now, you just have to document it. 'Cause it's so far off--it's two generations away. And I only know one thing, that even though it fades away, it can never fade away totally but to go through knowingly--to go through what any person went through, probably would commit suicide, half of the people. So this is why it's really important that uh, it should be documented to the best possible way, you know, to be able to pass it on to future generations to come.

Thank you.


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