At the beginning of December comes St. Nikolaus Day, which according to German tradition is an encouraging element for all children. They put their newly polished shoes outside the door where “Nikolaus” fills them with all kinds of goodies. In our convent there was one difference: we had to put our shoes in our bags to prevent the mice from getting to the goods.
During Advent we were woken up one night by a covered truck that drove in low gear, sneaking up towards our convent. But a truck’s engine can always be heard, even when good attempts are made to cover it up, so we looked out the window with great curiosity, but were ordered to immediately leave the windows and go back to bed. But we kept listening and wondered what on Earth a covered truck was doing here. Even the unloading of it sounded a little creepy. What was happening? After some clattering the truck drove away and the explanation to it all was given on Christmas Day. After breakfast we were all ordered to go down to the cellar, where we found new toboggans, skis, and poles. With a cry of joy we supplied ourselves two by two with toboggans. Erika would rather go skiing, but Eva and I went tobogganing down the many hills in St. Annaberg. There was plenty of snow and Christmas Eve went by quickly until evening came and it was time for the Christmas tree, candles, and many presents from home.
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During the time between Christmas and New Year we met a farmer with a team of horses, which with a loud neigh stopped and asked those of us who were on our way to the tobogganing hills with our toboggans if we were good tobogganers, to which we of course replied with a loud “Yes!” We told him that we knew all about how to move from right to left, slow down and stop, which is done with the heels of one’s boots and we Berlin kids are somewhat of experts at it. We then bound our toboggans in a long chain one after the other behind the team and they towed us away with cheers and songs by our camp and of course it was Helga who provided the funniest contributions. As usual she had been the source of some tricks and was ordered to clean the toilets instead of coming with us to the hills. She heard our laughter and came running out with the round toilet brush high above her head, threw herself on the last bit of space in the last toboggan and marked our curves from left to right with the brush. The villagers stood along the roads and howled with laughter, something that was rather unusual for the otherwise so rugged people of Schlesien.
Lost
Many small, clear streams that have carved deep grooves in the landscape run through St. Annaberg. They ran despite the cold and created ice crystals that cold January day in 1941. We five girls walked along the streams and watched the bubbles under the ice that was clear as glass. We talked about the birds and the bees, something that Erika and Helga knew more about than Eva and me. Helga and Erika talked while Eva made dreadful comments, but I thought it sounded logical from my own observations and fragments from the adult conversations I have heard. Ilse wanted to make some cheeky additions, but Erika asked her to keep her dirty Berlin mouth shut. Erika had authority and was most often obeyed.
I cannot remember more about their surnames than that Helga’s ended in -ski like mine. Eva and Ilse had typical German professional names, while Erika was proud to have a “von” name.
As an adult I am grateful that I got explanations and insights into adult life in this natural and respectful way, which can be quite troublesome for a woman. My wish to never become a woman was a somewhat hasty prayer, because we had gotten lost in the stream gullies, which branched out endlessly. When we climbed up the sides, we saw nothing but forest and fields, no houses and no roads. To top it all off it started to snow, which reduced our visibility to almost nothing. We walked and walked and froze! Helga tried to pep us with her chapbook songs, and I got asked about Sweden. Their questions took me back to an experience I had by the river in Mörrum in 1937. I was staying with a teacher and together with a girl from the neighbourhood we walked along the river on a beautiful summer day. In front of us in the distance there was a loony who was mumbling to himself. I wanted to turn around. I have always felt uncomfortable around that type of person in Sweden, where one could meet them every now and then, but they were never seen in Germany. My friend calmed me down and said that this loony was totally harmless and inoffensive, so we continued on our walk. But just as we passed him, this really ugly figure hollered and lifted a big rock to throw at us. We ran for our lives! I learned a lesson: do not trust the mentally ill no matter how much the people around me say that the person is harmless.
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The darkness began to fall. Tired and down-hearted, we stumbled through the snow, when we suddenly saw a few tiny rays of light and the contours of a road. We recognized where we were, and our arrival at the village where the residents had just been informed by our leaders of our disappearance, which caused worry and commotion, was met with great relief. We avoided squabbling and reproaches in our rather poor condition, and were put straight to bed. Erika, Helga, and Ilse were soon on their feet again, but Eva and I caught bad colds with high fever and thus received medical attention and care from our leaders. After all, they were responsible for us and took this opportunity as a tough test with an almost ardent compensation of exaggerated “feelings of guilt”.
When this episode was over and our health was restored, we received a message saying that our KLV camp was being moved to northern Schlesien, to Steinau, and a newly-built youth home because our convent was not seen to be especially healthy with its thick walls. With mixed feelings we packed our things. We found out that the youth home would of course have different personnel and that we would be together with a school group from another part of Berlin.
Materially it was an improvement, with a better kitchen, with food made by its own personnel, and a large, nice common room, wonderful dining rooms with views over Oder behind the plains, hygienic shower rooms, and light rooms. But 40-some teenagers did not quite feel at home there. Our previously unified “hedgehog family” became a thing of the past in this large group. Diligent adaptation and loss of identity was the price to pay for this higher standard. Though the summer in Steinau with swimming, physical training, and lots of outdoor activities with sports and helping out on the near-by farms made us physically strong and healthy.
Between the locks
Has the reader also felt a noticeable movement back in time in his or her life because of a scent, sound or sensation that almost causes a painful longing? That happened to me when I experienced the Borenshult locks on the Motala Canal towards Lake Boren in Sweden on a warm summer’s evening.
I was suddenly 50 years back in time, when I saw youngsters diving from the lock doors down into the canal. The typical splashing sound that echoed between the lock walls when they dove, the water trickling between the logs … it all reminded me of my own and my comrades’ lock pool in Steinau. It was the most fun retreat of the summer. It was not a real canal, it was a river that had been drawn through the town. We used to jump down from the lock door and let ourselves be supported by the current in the clear water. I wonder if descendants of the Polish conquerors have as much fun as we had, or if this river is also ruined and dirtied after 50 years of Communist rule and their inconsiderate destruction of the environment.
White lilacs
Steinau in Schlesien, 1941
A Swedish wanderer would pause in astonishment at the sight that met him or her at the south end of the little Schlesien town. In the setting sun, the reddish-brown block-house shone almost Falun red (almost red ochre, translator’s note). The white window frames and the white flagpole in front of the house further strengthened the similarities between it and a traditional Swedish estate building. Behind this house in a dip was a sporting facility. To the right there was a building that strongly resembled a Greek temple, but it was used as a modern gym. This was the room that could quickly be transformed into an excellent theatre.
The architect must have fancied the Swedish and Greek building styles. The melding of these gave the r
oom a perfect unity of beauty, style, and elegance. The excess of showy white lilac bushes lining the fence around the house, the sidewalks and the other buildings gave the impression that Mother Nature wanted to give something extra of spring luxury to this particular area. The river Oder shimmered in the distance like a glittering tiara. It was a wonderful spring evening. On the steps to the block-house, our modern youth shelter, that from the outside looked so peaceful, sat our substituting Schlesien youth leader, completely dejected. Song and laughter were heard from both the main floor and upstairs. The kind Schlesien girl had never had to deal with city kids before. But this spring evening I lay quietly and listlessly in my bed while the others romped and teased each other. Our usual leaders were at a meeting and my friends took advantage of the situation. As the saying goes, “When the cat’s away …”.
I usually partake in all the fun, but before our superintendent went to the meeting, I had gotten both a spanking and a thorough scolding. A stranded barge in Oder had enticed me. A poorly-built raft had capsized and I had come home to our camp in awful shape. My typical bad luck. Earlier when I had ridden on an ice sheet, the same thing happened to me.
Before the sunset had taken away the colours, I felt a light vibration in the metal bed and I got up quickly. Slowly a column of tanks and trucks with soldiers came driving by on the road. We ran to the windows. “Shall we pick lilacs for them?!” someone called. With cheers and without consideration for our clothing, which was our nighties, we opened the windows, jumped out, and picked lilacs from the over-full bushes. Bouquet after bouquet were given to the young soldiers, who started to sing. Truck after truck were honoured while we laughed and wished the soldiers luck. When the last one had driven by, we had to comfort our poor young leader and promise her that we would be good and go to bed if she would not tell the superintendent on us. We all kept our word, but …
A few weeks later a letter came from a young lieutenant:
“Dear girls!
If you only knew what joy and encouragement you gave us when we, depressed and tired, drove through Steinau. It’s not easy to leave one’s home country when there’s such a spring mood in the air. I myself am an orphan and have no one to grieve for me if I should fall in battle. Just then I thought that everything was meaningless. Words like ‘die for your father country’, ‘fight for Germany’ seemed so unreal to me somehow. That was the mood I was in when we drove by your beautiful youth shelter. Like a sign from above, it seemed to me, when you ran out and showered us with white lilacs. It was so wonderfully beautiful somehow, and I’m ashamed of my gloomy thoughts.
It is for you that we fight, to keep the purity, joyfulness and soundness of the German youth, for a world that needs it. As a memento from this unforgettable evening I have saved a little white lilac branch in my wallet.
I and my comrades thank you for your encouragement and the joy you have given us.”
That is what the superintendent read to us at the dinner table. “And”, she added, “as punishment for your disobedience, we will save up for a field post package at least once a month”. That “punishment” is one we took gladly. A beautiful friendship grew between 30 girls and a lieutenant. But not many packages were sent. He was killed in battle quite early in the Russian campaign and 30 pairs of girls’ eyes cried bitter tears when they received the sad news. The laughter in the camp was quietened for several days. One night a few of the girls snuck out with a wreath bound of leaves from the lilac bushes. The flowers had wilted long ago. But when the wreath, after being tossed into the river Oder, had floated away, it looked like it had started to bloom with glittering white lilacs—but maybe it was just the moonlight that reflected off of the wet leaves.
The four-leaf clover
Between the two buildings, the youth shelter and the gymnasium, we girls ran and talked gaily and full of hope about the coming Youth Day, when the hall would be transformed into an elegant theatre.
The “magic”, if I may call it that, with that building impresses people to this very day. The sports hall got so fully transformed that only the “shell” was recognizable.
On the Youth Day in August we were to show what we had learned and achieved in song, theatre, recital, etc. Everything was far from being political, so my number was to sing a Swedish hit song, as part of the Nordic element in the performance. I had heard a hit that was played on the radio during my visit to Sweden a couple of years earlier that was on one of the records on the spring-driven gramophones. The tune was easy and it even sounded to me as if it began in German.
The youth orchestra learned the song according to my instructions and I looked excitedly forward to my performance day. We were to rehearse a few more times before the dress rehearsal, and on the way from one of these rehearsals I shouted gladly, “Look! A four-leaf clover!” My friends started looking for more right away, but without any luck.
When we arrived to the shelter, our superintendent met us with the words, “There will be no performance for Vera. Your parents have sent a message from Berlin saying that you will be going home in a couple of days so that you can go with your father and brother on a holiday to Bromberg. Your mother, who is working at Abwehr (checking letters from Sweden during the war), must stay in Berlin”. I stared angrily at the four-leaf clover! Humbug. Four-leaf clover. What rubbish!
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I did not discover that it really was a lucky clover until many, many years later when I had moved to Sweden. The hit that I knew so well was sung on a TV-show “Bei mir rist du schenn”, not “schön” in German, as I understood it, but in Yiddish. Just think, I could have proudly and gladly stood there on stage and sung at the top of my lungs and danced all the steps to a Jewish-American hit that had been imported to Sweden, and that at the time was something of a protest song against Germany, in front of high-ranking National Socialist functionaries. So it really was a lucky clover after all.
Do you remember what an outcry there was in the Swedish media when the Finnish singer Arja Saijonmaa sang Zarah Leanders well-known pop songs from movies from the Third Reich at the Nobel party in Stockholm? Of all the Nazi-phobia-potentates, the journalist and politician Ingrid Segerstedt-Wiberg shouted loudest about revenge. Arja would not only be forced to publicly apologize, she would also face drastic obstacles when pursuing her career, etc.
Poppies
It was hot, very hot! The overcrowded train steamed with heat and raced together with the engine, which pulled us huffing and puffing through Schlesien towards Breslau.
I was the only one left from the Steinau camp. I would not be convinced by the director’s assertions that other KLV camps were much worse than ours. We had had a wonderful time together on the vacation in Bad Schwarzenberg, a small picturesque former hostel in the mountains in, as far as Schlesien is concerned, a well-known health resort.
I visited my grandmother in a near-by sea-side resort that she occasionally visited to relieve her rheumatism. Collecting different and colourful stickers was a hobby of ours, and we took long walks through the villages, looking for them, just as the visitors to the 1994 Winter Olympics in Norway did.
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Breslau turned out to be a big city that in many ways reminded me of Berlin, with its big apartment buildings and screeching trams. On the outskirts of Breslau there was a mighty fortress that looked like a medieval fairy-tale castle with pinnacles and towers. It turned out that this was the meeting place for KLV members who wanted to stay in the organization. And what a red display of colours that surrounded the fortress! The poppy field in different stages of maturity completely dominated the surroundings. The fortress was an exciting place for us and we enjoyed our complete freedom for two weeks in this fairy-tale environment. Units met, left, and new ones arrived.
Without knowing about the properties of poppy seeds, we ate the deliciously ripe ones we found, and got intoxicated. In that state we thought we were superior to most everythin
g and did a bunch of crazy things. We jumped off the high wood-burning stoves onto our beds with the bronze headboards and beautiful ornaments, surely antiques. All this noise prompted a thin, sharp-nosed noblewoman to suddenly appear. She was the owner of the fortress who lived in one of the wings. After consulting with the leaders, it was decided that our punishment would be to stack the wood in a wood shed, and the wood would be transported from the yard with a wheelbarrow. “And”, said the strict noblewoman, “I can hear the wheels on the wheelbarrow from my open window and I want to hear them, back and forth, so it’s not worth it to be lazy! Understood?!” We understood alright, but what she had not understood was that she was dealing with clever Berlin kids. We put one piece of wood in the wheelbarrow instead of filling it, and pushed it back and forth as ordered, and had in that way turned our “punishment” into merry mischief.
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But after just two weeks our “freedom” came to an end. It was just as well. Our consumption of poppy seeds would not have been good for us in the long run. In a group of 20 girls, we came to a well-disciplined camp in Lauban with observant and experienced leaders. We could ascertain that freedom was good, but there could be too much of a good thing, so we found a security and comfort right away in our new surroundings.
Heidi
Lauban fall/winter 1941/42.
Lauban: a small town in Schlesien, an idyllic place with smaller rows of houses, where the streets are lined with hostels and lanes that blended into the well-kept gardens between the houses. Our KLV camp was located in one of these houses. This was a totally different environment than the modern youth camps in Steinau by the Oder, my previous location.
In Steinau the bedrooms had bunkbeds, about eight to ten in each room, but here in Lauban each room had three comfortable beds and a really good desk by a large window. A big cabinet with a mirror on it emphasized the hostel decor even more. A rug on the floor and a big bowl with a jug on a sturdy steel stand in white in a curtained corner made our morning and evening toiletries really private and undisturbed. There was a common bathroom with showers and toilets in secluded areas, which was different from Steinau, where everything was new and modern, but in the “everything for everyone” style where there was no integrity. The whole hostel housed about 20 girls between the ages of 13 and 14.
When the Flagpoles Bloomed Page 6