Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

Martin Koby - April 20, 1999

Granddaughter

...and the kid, you know, thinking about uh, she says, "What did uh, what did Moses say to Pharaoh?" She says, "Let my people go." "And what did the mean Pharaoh say?" She says, "No!" So she...

How old is Julia? Two--she's two...

Two and a half years. She's two and a half now. But this happened before Pesach already you know, sometimes in early March. So the little kid--and I thought to myself, God, I must have been--I was wrong for many, for many years, didn't have faith in my kids.

It's hard to know. That's the most important thing, isn't it, for you?

It's important. Why is it that I myself, I'm in doubt or maybe even denial about my God ??? cockamamie person or whatever he is, yet I expected my kids to believe? But you know something, when we were in that DP camp after the war you know, 1946--'47, I had to go to cheder. I had to go to cheder. My father insisted and kind of blackmailed me. I don't know, maybe they didn't uh, but he says--told me, "Whatever you learn is yours. Whatever you believe--see, I want you to go to cheder so you'll know. As far as believing, what you do with this belief, it's up to you." He said, "But I want you to know, because someday you're going to be among Jews," and he says, "one, one lesson or one word or one get-together with the Jews is going to come, it's going to be important." And I told that to my kids, but I never thought that they were listening to what I'm saying. But now I know.

Hm.

I know more than I thought I knew about them.

Okay. Martin um, let's...

[interruption in interview]

I don't want to see anybody on Monday. I don't want to do anything on Monday. I don't want to be with anybody on Monday. And although they have all kinds of things to do on Monday, I just wonder what's happening to me.

It's Shabbos.

It's Shabbos? You know...

You think about this on Monday, is that what, what you mean? This...

I don't know.


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