May / June 2006:

Auschwitz, NY
With this issue, we are please to inaugurate our AJL Short Fiction series where we will run occasional pieces to eventually be included in an AJL Short Story collection. To kick things off, we've asked Professor Marc Miller, the youngest Yiddish teacher Emory's ever seen, to brighten our day with a tale of survival in the unlikeliest of places. So, without any further ado, we'd like to be the first to welcome you to Auschwitz, NY.

Story by Marc Miller



The Germans took everything away from me. So I came to New York, I lived in a little, dirty room on the East Side, and fed myself about once a day with the help of the Jewish charities. What was I supposed to do, get a job? Who needed another Jewish librarian? Sure, your father used to know six, seven, eight languages — fluently, you should know — but who didn't where I came from? And in New York? You know how many Mockies there were who also needed a way to feed themselves?

So what did I do all day instead of banging my head against the wall? I rode the subway. A pleasure. This was a different kind of train, the subway. Did we ever see such a thing in our lives? Up and down, back and forth, Manhattan to the Bronx to Queens to Brooklyn. I went everywhere. In the morning I would take a little lunch, maybe a sardine sandwich. I didn't need much, believe you me, I survived on much less in the camps.

So one day I was sitting on the train and I noticed a copy of the Truth on the floor. Of course, people always left their newspapers lying all around the whole city and above all in the subway, but a Yiddish paper? I picked it up and looked through it. Back in Vilna, in the Jewish library, I was in charge of the periodicals and I read them all. The Truth was once a great newspaper, but after the war, well, everyone was dead, so who was left to write for us? Bashevis? Feh.

So I looked through the whole thing, I read it cover to cover — did I have anything else to do with my time? — and I saw in the back, a big classified ad. I'll translate it for you, word for word, as best as I can:

Survivors looked for to establish new community. Are you a survivor from the concentration camp Auschwitz? A group of your colleagues wants to hear from you. Are you interested in living in a Jewish community in the mountains where there is fresh air? Serious inquiries only. Must be alone.

Actually, this last part I'm probably not translating in the exact perfect way. In Yiddish, the expression is eyner aleyn which means more like "all alone." This was the most important part.

So what's the story? Two Jews who escaped from Europe (but not before they went through plenty, believe you me), they came to New York in the middle of the war, and in a very short time, they were multi-millionaires. One day Hymie looks at Saul — those were their names — and says: "Saul, why are we breaking our backsides every day still? How much do we need? Let's sell the business and retire. We're still young. Let's enjoy our money." So Saul agrees, they sell it, and you have no idea how much they got for it. Bundles and bundles and bundles which they invested and re-invested with such luck, you and I should only have a fraction from a percentage to split between us.

But they were never greedy. In fact, you never saw two such generous men in your life. Go anywhere in the world, and I promise you'll see a Jewish building, a YMCA, a college dormitory, a community center, an I-don't-know-what, with one of their names hanging over the front door. To the state of Israel they've given millions over the years. But what was their dream? It was a wonderful place, but not anymore.

I went to the meeting. Would you believe more than a hundred people showed up? There were some old faces, some new ones, but two things everybody had in common: everybody traveled through Auschwitz and we were all orphans. But not only orphans. Eyner aleyn. We all had nobody, no wives, no husbands, no children and that's the way it had to be if we were going to live in this brand-new Catskills shtetl. Saul, he was the one who spoke better, he explained it all. They were establishing a place where people who had everything taken away from them by Hitler, may he drop dead again and again, could start a new life. But it ended with us, he said. When the last one of us died, so would the town. Stubborn old Jews. And what was the name of the new shtetl? I'm sure you already guessed by now: Auschwitz, New York.

They had already built a whole town, Saul explained. There were bungalows, tennis courts, a swimming pool, a lake. But it wasn't just a resort like they have everywhere. It was a real town with a bank, a couple stores, two kosher restaurants, an old age home, a little hospital and a library. A few days after the meeting they interviewed those of us who were still interested, and give a guess, who do you think became the librarian? That's right, me, little Noah, your father.

"This is a very serious job," Saul said to me. "One of the most serious. You are responsible for preserving our lives, our history."

So that is what I did. For almost fifty years I lived in Auschwitz. Sounds funny, right? But that was the point. We took this horrible name and gave it a new meaning. Auschwitz became Paradise. That was where I met my Reizel, she should forever rest in peace. She also worked in the library. In the summertime we would sit on the porch of our little bungalow and I would read Yiddish poetry to her, the pages lit by the moon. Then, when the moon would go and hide behind one of the big mountains, we would hold hands and look at the stars. Every night we gave them different names for all the people we lost, bringing them all back to life forever in the sky. It was a perfect life. Until he came and ruined it all. Just like Hitler, may he drop dead again and again. That was even what I called him. He hated that nickname.

"How can you call me that?" he asked me one day, "a Jew?"

"Because that's the worst name I could think of," I told him.

There were about seventy of us in the beginning. At first, we all lived in the bungalows, but soon many moved into the old age home. In fact, Saul and Hymie had to keep building new wings because so many people were old and getting sick and couldn't live on their own anymore. After it was clear that those people would never live again in their bungalows, you know what Saul and Hymie did? They destroyed them. The houses, I mean, not the people. We were already destroyed. So they tore down the little homes. After we were all gone, taken away a second and final time, no greedy goyim were going to come along and claim our homes like they did when we disappeared the first time in Europe. When I came back to Hotzenplotz, that drunk bastard who lived next door to my parents, your grandparents (if you can believe such an old father once had parents), he had chickens in the house. I asked him what he was doing in my house and he pointed his shotgun in my face and told me it was his house now.

Of course, people died all the time in our Auschwitz. But Saul and Hymie hired the best doctors, right out of medical school, and paid them double what they would get in the city. But how long can sick people live?

One day, about two years ago, Saul came to the library like he did every morning at exactly nine, when I would bring him the morning papers from New York. Usually he would sit there quietly for a few hours and read every paper from cover to cover. But sometimes we would shmooze, especially on special occasions. Like when he had recruited a new resident. This was Saul's obsession, especially after Hymie died. That's right. I forgot to tell you. Hymie died about fifteen years ago. They both worked very hard trying to find people, but it was tough. Yeah, of course, to find an Auschwitz survivor is hard enough, but one who is committed to never having a family? Not so easy.

In the last few years of his life, all Saul wanted was more and more residents. Every day he would go to his office and make phone calls and search the Internet — he taught himself — looking for Auschwitz, dreaming of Auschwitz. So that one morning, after I brought him his papers and a coaster shaped like the state of New York for his coffee mug and said "Good Morning" like I always did, I looked at his face and saw he had this big, big smile.

"Saulie," I said. "What happened? Did you win the lottery or something?"

This was funny since he was already so rich.

"Better," he said.

He told me he found somebody, a new resident.

"The nursing home isn't full enough already?" I said.

"This one isn't going there," he smiled at me.

"So, who's the lucky guy?" I asked. I was curious.

"Mordecai Melamed," he said, with a voice like I was supposed to know who that was.

Who was he? Saul said he was a hero, a real Jewish war hero. What did he do? That's a very good question. Actually, the better question is what did he really do? Let me tell you what he claimed, what he still claims to this day, and what everyone believes. Everyone except for me. Eyner aleyn.

You heard of the Warsaw Ghetto? Of course you did. If you didn't, God help you. So he said he was a hero from the Warsaw Ghetto uprising. What happened? Here's his story. He wrote it himself, in Yiddish, and it appeared in our weekly newspaper, The Free Voice of Auschwitz. Saul was the editor-in-chief and he published a special edition the day before Melamed arrived. Give a listen to this garbage:

My Dear Jews,

I tremble with delight at the glorious prospect of joining you in your holy town in the mountains which I am proud to call my new home. I greatly anticipate meeting every one of you, my new family.

What a combination-maker, what a bastard.

My story is a sad one, like all of yours I am sure, but, like yours, it too has a happy ending. From Auschwitz to Auschwitz. My story begins in my Warsaw, my dear beloved Warsaw, where I grew up and went to school, where I knew all the people on my street and where they all met death. All. My mother, my father, seven brothers and sisters, my grandparents, my friends, my neighbors. All went up the chimney. But not me. I would not be destroyed by Hitler.

Feh. He mentions the name of the Satan and does not even add "may he drop dead again and again" after his name. Did you ever see such a thing?

I was a fighter. I'm sure many of you heard the name Mordecai Anielewicz. He was my brother. Not my real brother, but my brother-in-arms. The two Mordecais they called us. You know the whole story. April 1943. For two months we fought the Nazis like dogs. All we had were a few pistols, a few rifles, but we made plenty of trouble for them. You know what happened to Mordecai. He died. I was with him in those last moments. We were running down the street together and he got hit. Right in the chest. I held him and I said: "Mordkhele, tell me, what I can do?" "Leave me. Leave me here to die in the street. Finish the fight. You are the leader now." "No!" I screamed at the top of my voice. I carried him over my shoulder and ran into the sewers, but he died before I could treat him. A few days later, they burned the ghetto. Finally I was caught. What could I do? First they brought me to Majdanek. I am sure some of you passed through that hell, so I do not need to describe to you what I saw there. I was there a while and then I was transported to Auschwitz. I certainly do not need to recount what went on there. Yet I survived again and kissed the feet of the Soviet saviors in March, 1945. And now I come to help build a new Auschwitz, our Auschwitz. Auschwitz, New York.

A nice story, no? Very nice, except that it's not true. How do I know? I'll tell you. Melamed made some mistakes in his old woman's tale. First of all, I spent my whole life in the library, first in Vilna and then in Auschwitz, New York — two of the finest Jewish libraries in the history of our people — and in all of my reading about Warsaw, I never heard of "The Two Mordecais." Second, Melamed claimed he fought for two months, but everyone knows the battle lasted a little less than one month. Another thing, Mordecai Anielewicz died in his bunker, not in the sewer. And finally, Auschwitz was liberated by the Soviets at the end of January, not in March of 1945.

After I read this piece of trash, I went right over to Saul.

"He is a fraud," I said.

"Noah, how can you say that?" he asked me with such a sad look.

I almost wished I hadn't said anything. He depended too much on new people. But I couldn't hide the truth.

"Noah," he said. "It was such a long time ago. So what? So he says one month instead of two months? So he says March instead of January? He doesn't remember perfectly."

"But Saul, the two Mordecais?"

"So what?" Saul said. "Even if he did exaggerate a little, he's still a survivor, right? And look at how he brought this place back to life. How many old people we got here?"

"Everybody."

"That's right. But you saw how he writes? Like a young man. He is helping to keep Auschwitz alive."

If he wasn't a real hero the first time around — and I'm telling you he certainly wasn't — he became a hero here. How the women competed for his attention! He used to sit at a table in the back of the dairy restaurant (the no-goodnik was a vegetarian) where he held court. The balebostehs would come and giggle like little girls. When the old waitress did not move fast enough for him, the women would fetch his blintzes and bring him more hot water for his tea. I never sat at his table. In fact, I never even talked to him until he finally came over to me in the library one day, maybe a couple weeks after he came.

"Peace unto you," he said to me.

"Unto you peace," I said, like a polite Jew. Your father is not a bastard.

"I don't think we ever met," he said.

"I think you're right," I said and went back to straightening the books on the shelf.

"You are the famous Noah," he said. "How is it that we have never spoken? Are you mad at me?"

"Why should I be mad at you?" I asked.

"That's what I'm asking," he said.

So I told him. I let him have it. And you know what he did? He just stood there and smiled while I pointed out the inconsistencies in his story. He didn't even argue. When I finished, he leaned over and whispered inside my ear: "You know something, Noah? You're a smart little man."

And that was it. He knew I knew but it didn't bother him. Still, I told everybody, anyone that would listen. I even wrote a letter to the editor of the newspaper. I begged him. I told him people needed to know the truth, that we shouldn't worship false heroes. But Saul wouldn't publish it. Still, I know he believed me. I knew Saul a long time, brought him his papers every morning for fifty years. I knew from his eyes. He died a month later. The doctor said it was from a stroke, but I know it was really from a broken heart. I broke it.

Tell me, what was I supposed to do? Scream myself hoarse? Who would listen to a crazy old man that wants to smash a Holocaust hero?

So I left the mountains and now I'm back where I started, not in Europe, in America, I mean. The Lower East Side. But it's no more what it used to be. The Truth building is now a Chinese temple. The old café next door is now a Chinese restaurant. One day this whole neighborhood will be one big Chinese restaurant. What can I do? Your mother, my second little wife, young enough to be my daughter and almost too old to be pregnant, she sits at home and rests her legs (I am taking pictures of her fat belly for you to see what you looked like from the outside). Money is not an issue. Saul knew I would not stay in Auschwitz so he left me enough I shouldn't have to worry. So what should an old fool do all day? Thank God, I can still get around and the subway still goes everywhere. Sometimes I go out to Coney Island — you should have only seen what it used to be, Coney Island — but it's completely different there too. Russians. They call themselves Jews. They're not Jews.



If you'd like to comment on this article, email us a Letter to the Editor.