Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

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Natalie Zamczyk - January 30, 1984

And I was like in a trance. I didn't know what I am doing. We came to his house, you know, and his wife was talking to me and I said to her--and I didn't say nothing, you know. I, I, I couldn't even answer because I still was hearing the terrible, the terrible scream of those mothers where the children were killed and the children, the children, little children they didn't understand, screaming of the children, screaming of the mother. And this terrible was in my ears ringing and she was talking to me and serving the table and I couldn't even open my mouth. I only was smiling. And, but after awhile I, I had to, you know. So we start to talk and she asked me questions. And she said, you have a son, I said yes, but he's with my husband. And I took a picture, beautiful picture of the boy, and she said, he's a beautiful child, but you know the eyes are so sad, like Jewish, you know. I started, I was a wonderful actress. I started to learn, imagine. And I said to her, and, you know, nobody told me something like this, my husband. And I showed my husband and she said, oh yeah. And you see me? She has a beautiful blue eyes. She said, well, I don't know, sometimes. And that's all. But I knew, I stayed there and I knew this town is, is disastrous for me. And two days later, and uh, yeah, this was, yeah, and two days later there was again an evacuation from those people in Miendzyrzec Podlaski. I, I didn't know about it. We had a cantina, I went for supper there and the girls, I saw that the girls were very excited. You see, I wanted to show you Polish people how they are. This one like to see that, okay. In the cantina were woman and there were boys, Jewish boys. I didn't know they are Jewish from the working. They came, I saw this, I was witness of it. They were crying, those girls. I said, why you are crying? Ah, because they are evacuating, evacuation is going to be. And I saw the two women giving to the two young boys eggs, boiled eggs and bread. Take this and run away in the, in the--not field uh, in the forest. Run away. When it's going to be quiet, God help you. You know, and they were not Jewish women, they were. You see, you can see that you can't say that everybody's bad, you know.