Tape number 8, an interview with a lady named Makower is being conducted by Joanna Wróblewska.
Would you like to introduce your family to us?
Here you can see my closest family, a daughter, a son and grandchildren.
I would like to start with my son, Józef Makower, born on February 18, 1949.
He is a doctor of medicine.
My daughter, Irena Makower, was born on July 7, 1950.
My grandson, Daniel Makower, was born on August 12, 1971.
Bartek Zuber was born on July 24, 1974.
My daughter, Kasia Zuber, was born on September 5, 1982.
My daughter, Irena Makower, was born on September 5, 1982.
This is where I would like to end my presentation of my grandchildren, because that's all.
Józef, I would like to ask you how you experienced your childhood as a child of parents who went through the ghetto.
Were you aware of it?
I was always aware of it, as far as I remember.
That my parents were in the ghetto, that he was running away from the ghetto, that he was hiding from the Poles in Miłosna.
And that my father's family and partly my mother's family died in Treblinka.
I was fully aware of it throughout my childhood.
When you went to school in Poland, did you feel different from your peers?
I was a bit of a different child, but not because I was Jewish or that my parents went through the war.
I thought I was a bit of a different child.
In which year and why did you come to Sweden?
I came in 1969, towards the end of the year, with the wave of emigration, mainly of Jewish youth, but also of other adult people.
Because of persecution during 1968-1969.
Personally, I was never persecuted, but what was happening in Poland at the time caused me to go to Sweden first as a tourist and then I met my future wife.
And then I came to her after a few months.
Your son Daniel is here with you today.
Because Daniel doesn't speak Polish, I would ask you to say a few words about him.
How much does he know about your past and the past of your grandparents?
It's a question of conscience, because I don't know exactly what he knows.
I've told him a lot of things.
He certainly doesn't know as much as I do, because he didn't learn directly from his grandmother, who doesn't speak Swedish well.
In Polish.
You don't speak Swedish well.
But he knows more facts about my family.
He knows more facts than I do.
Józef, as a Jew, did you try to raise Daniel when he was a child in the Jewish spirit?
And was he aware of your origin from Poland?
He was aware of my origin from Poland, that I was a Jew and that I left Poland for this reason, that I was a Jew.
However, our family was an emancipatory family, not an orthodox family.
And basically, I would say that Hitler said that they were Jews.
This whole identification and Jewishness mainly has to do with the war and Hitler, and less with deeper experiences.
That's how the family was.
So, as a child, you felt that you were very assimilated, you didn't feel different from the Poles.
No, no.
I wanted Daniel to be raised in the Jewish spirit.
And, among other things, I went to Hitler's Kowloon, and Daniel is very Jewish.
This is his fiancée, Hanna, from Poland.
Not from Poland, her parents are partly from Poland.
Do you feel at home?
Yes.
Because she was born here.
I feel more Jewish than my parents, and Daniel even more.
Thank you.
Irena, I would like to ask you now.
How young were you when you realized that you were Jews and not Catholics living in Poland?
We were Catholics because we went to church.
Our children went to church, and our parents slept on Sundays, and we went to church with Mrs. Lodzia and Kazia.
Because they were your guardians?
Yes, so it had nothing to do with Catholicism.
For me, religion and Judaism are two completely independent things.
The only thing is that we are Jews, and I knew that from the beginning. We always heard all the stories about the ghetto and the war while eating on Sundays.
We are named after those people from the family who died.
Józek is after Henryk's brother, and his sister had a daughter named Irena.
It was not at all pleasant to know that we were named that way.
It has to do with the fact that they were called that way. My father often talked about how his family brought his mother, his sister, and Irena to Auschwitz.
To Treblinka.
We always knew that, but it was very complicated.
We went to church, and we were also Jews.
My father was very proud that he was a Jew.
When we were talking to Mrs. Lodzia in the evening, she said, "Look, there's Henryk's shadow behind the door.
He doesn't want us to say 'paciorek', but we will say 'paciorek'."
That's how it was. It was complicated, but we never liked church, and Józek and I never believed in it.
We only did it because we were told to.
Would you say that you grew up without faith in God or in religion?
Without faith in any religion.
Did it ever bother you in your childhood?
Yes, it was very complicated, because everyone didn't believe in it, they liked it, it was all about communion and so on, and we were just different.
Did other children at school prevent you from feeling that way?
Elżunia Fabian, who was half-Jewish at the time, Elka Fabian, do you remember?
No, I don't.
Anyway, she was in school.
The first Jewish emigration was when I was in the second grade, and some of my friends went to Israel.
I remember a boy I fell in love with.
And then it started to get a little unpleasant.
Elżunia Fabian said that Irenka was a Jew, that Irenka didn't go to church.
Everyone goes to church, but Irenka doesn't like it, she doesn't go there, I don't know.
And finally her parents called and apologized, and they came to us, I remember.
Do you remember? He was a doctor.
I remember. Don't ask, because it's all recorded.
Did you experience anti-Semitism during your studies in Poland?
Anti-Semitism was an inseparable part of Poland.
We always had anonymous phones at home, always, since I remember.
At least since I started to wear headphones, every day, once a week, or something like that.
It was a part of it all.
But I didn't feel anti-Semitism in any special way.
On the contrary, I thought it was good for all my intellectual and snobby friends to have their own intellectual Jew,
and to have friends with him.
But I didn't know any Jews in Poland.
I didn't know any Jews in Poland.
So we were raised completely...
Because you didn't have any friends.
Yes, they left for Israel.
I didn't have any. There was a Jewish school in Wrocław, but I didn't know anything about it.
Now that you have two children, how old are they?
Bartek is 22, and Kasia is 14.
How do you try to raise them, and how much do they know about the fate of their grandparents?
It's very complicated. What was more complicated was the trip to Sweden.
I'm sorry, what year did you go to Sweden?
In '82. In '81.
Bartek was 7 years old at the time.
He didn't know I was a Jew at the time.
My husband, Zbyszek Zuber, is Polish.
He started going to first grade, and he was supposed to go to religion school.
We went to Sweden, and he had to adapt to Sweden.
I thought I wouldn't complicate his life by adding that I was a Jew.
But I was 11, 12, 13. Do you remember?
I have no idea.
Somewhere around that age, because I thought it was the time.
I told him everything. I talked to my mother, and so on.
It was the same with Kasia, when she was 11, 12.
I didn't want to complicate her life either.
It was complicated for her to the point where she was a double person.
I didn't want to add a third person to her.
Now that you live in Sweden, do you have any contact with the Jewish community or Jews in Sweden?
No, I don't have any contact with the Jewish community.
However, I know some Jews, just like any other person.
If I have a fate with someone I like, I contact them.
But I don't have any special contacts.
What holidays do you celebrate at home?
We celebrate Christmas, a normal Catholic Christmas.
Children love it.
We make poems for presents.
And we celebrate the New Year in a normal way.
Not Jewish.
We never celebrated it at home.
Thank you.
Bartek, now it's your turn.
Bartek, I would like to ask you.
Your mother told me that you were quite big when you came to Sweden.
And that you found out quite late about what your grandparents went through.
Did you think about their fates during the war?
Did you ask your grandmother these questions?
I don't remember exactly, but I don't think so.
Did you suspect as a child that your family was a bit different from others?
No, I didn't have a special interest in history.
I was more interested in biology and such things.
I didn't think about it, I didn't reflect on it.
I know that you are a biology student.
And that your grandfather, Henryk Makower, was a professor of microbiology.
He was a biologist.
Did the fact that your grandfather had this profession and position direct you?
Or is it completely independent?
No, no, I don't think it's completely independent.
I'm just curious.
I also study molecular biology, virology and microbiology.
Just like my grandfather.
But I don't think that's why he did it.
I'm just curious.
Maybe it's in the genes, I don't know.
At this moment, when you found out that your mother is Jewish,
did you start to think about what Judaism is?
Yes, I thought about it a bit.
We had a religion at school and I found out a bit about it.
But for me it only has a positive meaning.
I don't think about it.
Jews, people often look at them as quite intelligent.
Frank Bungsrich, I don't know.
For me it only has a positive meaning.
I never had any negative associations with Jews.
As if someone could say something to me.
You, who now live in Sweden,
have you come across Swedes who asked you about your origin?
I don't know if they asked, but it comes up sometimes when we talk.
And sometimes I say that I'm Jewish.
I haven't heard anything negative.
Only some people say, "Oh, you're Jewish, that's why you're so talented."
Do you believe that?
No, I don't know.
A lot of Jews are at home all over the world.
Genetically or not.
Or just as a family.
I don't know.
Do you sometimes discuss with your sister, who can't be here today,
the fate of your grandparents?
Have you read the books that were published by Noem and Macower?
I've read them.
Well, not all of them, but almost.
I've read almost both of them.
I liked them, I read quite a lot.
But I don't think she's particularly interested in them.
She's still quite childish.
I'm not particularly interested in them.
I'd rather be 100% Swedish if I didn't want to.
Now I'd like to go back to Noem and Macower.
Yes, I'd like to.
I'd like to ask you now, what would you like to pass on to your children and grandchildren?
I'll say it very briefly.
I'd like them to be decent people.
I think that's all.
As you know, I'm not interested in the law of faith.
I want them to be decent people
and, if possible, to learn a lesson that they can use for the good of others.
Thank you very much.
Tłumaczenie i transkrypcja: Krzysztof Czart
© PTA / TVP