Pauline Kleinberg - October 28, 1982
Hearing Word of Younger Sister
But in the meantime, there were other sick girls. And everybody had a visitor. And one girl noticed--she was coming in a few days. They said--she came over to my bed, and she said, "You know, what you mind asking me, I seen every bed has somebody's coming. I been coming here for a few days, I haven't seen anybody coming to see you." So I cried. I said, "Because I haven't got anyone. No one even knows that I'm here." Because I was assigned a room and I've never been seemed. I was staying in the hospital ever since. So she said, "Where have you been? What camp?" She said, "I'm from a camp too. I'm, I'm Bergen-Belsen by the British--that's the British. And I heard that I have a cousin here, she doesn't have anyone, she's sick. I came to see her and I found my brother-in-law. I lost my sister, my brother-in-law is here." Said, she said, "What camp were you?" I said, "I was in Green...in Neustadt in Gruenberg." Says "I'm from Neustadt. Neustadt is a nearby camp from Gruenberg, also Middle Silesian." She said, "There, there are a lot of girls and a lot of 'em and still in uh, in uh, Bergen-Belsen." You heard of Bergen-Belsen? So she said, "What is your name?" I said--by chances I said--"I had sisters, I had a brother, I have a young mother." She said, "I heard of that name, but I can't place the name." I said, "Pariser." She said, "I heard of that name, but I can't place, I can't place the girl." There were so many, not everybody knew everybody well. She said, "But I'm going back there to Bergen-Belsen. I came just to visit. Not uh, if I won't find uh, your sister dead or alive, I'm going to see other girls, they know her, if they heard about her." She said, "But if you should be released from this hospital"--I said, "Now my cousins are somewhere in Heinering. They don't even know that I'm here in hospital." They knew that I was in, in uh, Munich. She said, "But when you be released, don't go to your cousins and I'm going to find out, because Bergen-Belsen, uh, Neustadt was liberated in Bergen-Belsen, and I heard of a girl named Pariser. So I let you know, and I'll be back in two or three weeks."
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