Sidy Weiss - January 7, 1987
Start of War
When the, when the changes came...
Yeah.
...what did your friends who weren't Jewish do? Were they afraid for you? Did they try to help you?
Some people were very--how you call it? When, when I came back you mean?
No. Uh, when uh, when Slovakia became um, a separate government, under Tiso...
Yeah.
Yeah. What, what, when the laws, when the anti-Jewish laws were passed uh, did your friends try to help? Did they--were they concerned, were they worried about you? Were they upset or did they just walk away?
No they were, they were kind, they were kind.
They were. How did they help?
How they helped?
Yeah.
They did all kind of a, all kind of a things.
Food? Did they give you food? What, what in particular did they do? [long pause] Let me stop this.
[interruption in interview]
Um, when did, when did life start to change for you?
When did life started to change for me?
Yeah. When?
When I, when I came back.
Well I mean um, when Czechoslovakia was dismembered--was taken apart, and Slovakia became a separate country...
Yeah.
Do you remember when that was? What happened, what happened then?
Well, in 1938 they took us away I think, in 1938.
To where?
We were taken away to [pause] Auschwitz.
In 1938? No, later than that.
Later.
Well did, did they stop you from going to school? Did you have to stop going to school in 1938?
No.
Were there anti-Jewish laws? Did your father lose his business?
Everything.
He lost everything?
Everything.
And then what happened? How did that affect the family? When he lost everything? [long pause] How did, how did the family continue to exist then, if everything was taken away?
Husband: Uh, can I?
Sure.
Husband: She lost everything from the bottom to the top. Now she's too excited. Everything, everything.
How you call it...
Why don't you just tell me what you want--what you think you should tell me about what happened to you.
Well, we had our how you call that, we had a party store at home. Not a party store, a...
A general store.
General store and uh, we were five children and uh, no, I want, I want you to know this.
Okay. Whatever you think you should tell me, I'll listen. [pause] When did your father lose the store? Do you remember when?
Which year it was?
Yeah.
I don't know.
Well, how did it happen? Did somebody come and say the store's not yours anymore? Who came, do you remem...how did that happen?
They, they, they how you call that, took over the borders.
Okay, the Hungarians you mean?
Yeah.
Yeah. And then what happened?
Then what happened?
Did the gendarmes come to your house? Did the police come?
Yeah.
And what did they, what did they do?
They, they, how you called it, they took us, they took us away.
Where did they take you?
They, they came into the house. Wait a minute, that's want I wanted to say that we...
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